Fred Burwell

Kloof: A mechanical attachment used to provide dexterity to sentient ungulates.

Urko visited the Kloofeteria, where an assistant helped him try on four varicolored neon kloofs, which fit front and back hoofs perfectly. At last, instead of kicking away unwanted tennis balls, he was able to pick them up and eat them. Instead of leaving angry hoof-marks on books, he could actually turn pages and read the stories. The kloofs were an utter delight – he never had to trim them and he never had to coat them with hoof cream in winter, unlike his hoofs, which became brittle and cracked. There was no such thing as “kloof cream.” You didn’t need it.

One day, while perusing his favorite volume of encyclopedia (the “U” volume of course), Urko discovered that somehow, without consulting them, dinosaur-obsessed scientists had deviously replaced the name of his type of mammal, once euphoniously known as “ungulata” with either “perissodactyla” or “artiodactyla.” – they couldn’t seem to make up their minds which. As a proto-beatnik type of ungulate, Urko naturally preferred “artiodactyla” which got him pondering about art, a subject he often pondered his deepest ponders about. Urko had noticed the unusual mosaic of tracks that kloofs left in the mud he liked to cool off in. After experimenting with a variety of patterns and creating his own personal style, Urko invented an entirely new art form, at first known as “Art Urko,” but after it caught on with other artist-ungulates, as “Art Kloof.” Unfortunately, within days, Kloof manufacturers underwent major nuisance lawsuits from several individuals named “Art Kloof.” Tied up in litigation for years, “kloofmania,” as the media referred to it, underwent severe decline until now no one is sure if kloofs ever truly existed.

Its actual meaning: “a deep glen: ravine”

Biramous: an unusually intelligent, two-whiskered mouse. Several whisker strands fuse together into horn-like projections from each side of the mouse’s mouth. Because of their tensile, metallic-like strength and conductivity, the fused whiskers act like radio antennae, drawing broadcasts from around the world directly into the mouse. Because of their keen minds and sponge-like absorptive abilities, the average biramous quickly becomes conversant in a multitude of languages, especially that of advertising. The enlarged biramous speech box provides startling resonance, allowing many biramouses successful careers as radio announcers, deejays, and voice over artists. No doubt you’ve heard them advertising cheese.

Legend has it that Amos was the most famous biramous of them all, although cantankerous cranks groused that he was a louse, except when most sonorous, which brought down the house. Vain and snooty (but never snouty), Amos always wore a sunny yellow mouse-blouse featuring glamorous photographs of himself posing at the microphone. Some say that only a blasphemous ignoramus would frown at such a vainglorious biramous as Amos.

Actual definition of biramous: having two branches, as those on the appendages of crustaceans.

Whaup: A particular sound produced by members of the obscure religious sect known as “Burpers” at the exact second they reach their daily moment of enlightenment.

Franklin was a recent convert to the Burpers, swayed by their promise of enlightenment – deep and soulful riches beyond imagination. However, try as he would, meditating for hours on end by himself and in large groups, he’d never emitted more than a tiny “uhp” which reminded his fellow Burpers of the sound one makes after swallowing an under ripe grape. Castigated for his failure, reviled for his undeniably weak belching ability, thrown out on his own devices, (etc. etc.), Franklin dragged himself to the nearest mountain (some ten thousand miles away), planning to end it all. He sat in an old shepherd’s hut, high above a darkling plain and gave it one last try. He’d consumed a cucumber steak with watermelon gravy and found it too rare for his liking. His stomach, however, seemed to be speaking to him and he felt insistent, mystical words rising up, clamoring to get out. He opened his mouth and felt the “whaup” coming, but only a stray “wherefore” slipped out. Steeling himself, he tried yet again and this time, at long last (he thought), the whaup tumbled down his chin, only to turn into a “wherewithal.” In despair, he rose swiftly, stepped forward to pitch himself down the steep slope…and then that most lovely and rare of words, “whaup” slithered out of his mouth and swirled in the mists of the canyon below, echoingly brightly (or was it damply?) from peak to peak, wall to wall, finally settling on a radio tower where it became part of an international broadcast listened to with delight by every biramous near and far.

Actual definition of whaup: “a European curlew.” A curlew is a species of bird.

Scripsit: In the golden days, perhaps as far back as Shakespearean times (if indeed Shakespeare existed – some literary scholars believe that his plays were actually written by someone named Marlowe’s ghost – an early example of ghostwriting) a playwright would finish his script and then sit on it for awhile, waiting until it was truly ready for producing at the Globe or one of the many other English theaters such as the Hoot or the Catcall. Of course some of the more superstitious playwrights took this literally and actually sat on the script. Eventually finding the process eminently impractical and ridiculously tedious, the playwrights hefted themselves up and ambled down to the Fowle Guild, thinking that if chickens and Cornish game hens and other fowl had the leisure time to sit on eggs, why not scripts? So the guild masters formed an auxiliary and christened it the Scripsit Guild. They allowed only the most patient birds to act as scripsits, since, unlike silky smooth eggs, the parchment felt rough and the ink stained their feathers – plus nothing ever hatched, not even an idea. Playwrights utilized scripsits well into the 19th century until the industrial revolution, when an enterprising inventor created a mechanized scripsit, which eventually evolved into a theatrical agent.

Makepeace Voltaire was the most famous playwright from Devonshire, Piznitz-on-the-wold, Merry-in-the-pigsty, England, although local publicans liked to remind visitors that Makepeace was the only playwright ever to have come from Devonshire, Piznitz-on-the-wold, Merry-in-the-pigsty, England. Renowned for his tragicomic dramaturgy, praised for his facility with what critics even in those days referred to as the English language, Makepeace felt justified in calling himself Makepeace. Sadly, however, come 1642 he fell on hard times. To critics and the public alike, his plays seemed half-baked, regurgitated and spit out. Something was seriously wrong with his dialogue (‘Alas!’ seemed to be repeated every other line). Something was seriously amiss with his stage directions (men with spears kept tripping over each other and bumping into walls). His closest friend, the Dutch poet, Hans Moo (umlaut over the first o) urged him to either give up or give in – “Ach dermitzich nurdengammer fichiflachtifechtidammerung,” he said, which loosely translated (Makepeace believed) meant, “Go to the guild and get yourself a scripsit, goshdarn.”

So, Makepeace visited the Scripsit Guild and returned with a rather taciturn peahen named “Elizabeth” who, after carefully arranging her feathers, sat on Makepeace’s latest creation, a play about a farmer who has a problem with too many leeks, entitled, The Farmer Who Had Way Too Many Leeks. Hours passed, days passed, and Elizabeth sat stolidly and stoically, never allowing Makepeace even the tiniest peep at the script to see if it was ready. She just stared balefully at his nose and occasionally took a nip at it. Finally, two weeks later, she stood up, ruffled her rump, and stepped away from the script. Makepeace was astounded to discover the play renamed Elizabeth of Devon, now a romance about a lonely woman with a rather bird-like face, pining for her lost love, a young ne’er-do-well. Finally, a rich baron whose serfs were world-renowned for their ability to grow the finest leeks, sweeps her off her feet and they live happily – or perhaps not – in a castle full of leaks. Needless to say, the play was a roaring success and the envy of every playwright, even that Shakespeare, or whatever his name was.

Actual meaning: he (or she) wrote (it): placed after the author’s name on a manuscript, etc.