A Tame Turkey Ain't No Sport

Bub listened as the chimps played outside the caddyshack. The shrill screams and muffled moans meant that the chimps had caught yet another puttster who had wandered away from his foursome and suddenly found himself at the bottom of a particularly deep bunker, as stale melon rinds and old rubbers showered down from above. The chimps knew how to have a good time. Next to the games of blanket tag and rock 'em sock 'em nutjob, pinioning a golfer in a hole full of sand was big, big fun.

Bub contemplated the rug he was hooking. The orange stallion galloping through a field of pink just didn't look right. Had he bought the wrong yarn? What was wrong with his hooking? These questions rattled around Bub's brain like a high-octane-powered hen. Was it the palm tree in the corner that pained him so, or was there something else? Maybe the scene needed a baton twirler . . . maybe a baton twirler on the horse. Bub's fingers trembled as he rooted through the pile of ripped-open paper bags and searched for the stub of a golf pencil on which to work out his ideas.

His hand hit something wet and warm.

There were many things in Bub's bags. Scraps of wax paper covered in minute scribblings; the squeaker from a long-lost party horn; multicoloured tatters of yarn ends; a long-forgotten letter to Scott. Bub was aware of what was in his bags. True, there were times when he wouldn't be able to recall absolutely everything but he could come close. However, he certainly knew that there was nothing which would be both warm and wet.

Bub hesitated.

Should he pull it out?

With a steady nerve and rubber determination, Bub grasped the object and yanked. A wet paintbrush fell to the floor. Its contents of green paint immediately cutting a swath across the hardwood. Bub was flummoxed.

"Where the hell did that come from?" Bub questioned the brush.

A banging of the screen door announced that the chimps had finished with the golfer and had come into the caddy shack to tank up on more purple Freshie and Keebler Stonemasons. The chimps, enmasse, froze. Like some crazed ping-pong ball, their eyes bounced from clown to brush and back to clown. Their simian minds straining to make sense of the tableau. They had seen the cruel rendering left by hooligans by the Clubhouse turn. They had noted that the portrait had been done in green paint. They understood that the brush on the floor was covered in green paint. They knew that Bub's hand was green. But all they could do was chutter and clack at one another.

"Bub! Oh jeez! Aw! Bub!"

Bub stood motionless. He knew that the chimps would carry on like this for at least a few more hours. If he was going to get to the bottom of the matter, he would have to act fast. Someone had obviously planted the brush in his bag. That much was certain. But who and why and when?

"Forget it," Bub thought to himself. "I'm going to get ripped! You chimps stay here and keep the sterno can lit. If even so much as one of you tries to knit a mink, there'll be hell!"

The chimps cowered into a corner.

Bub scooped up the brush, the pencil stub, his rug, and all the paper bags. He stumbled over his shoes, the resulting ear-splitting "Wee-urp!" sent the chimps into a paroxysm of screeching and biting. They immediately crapped everywhere. Some started to hurl the feces at Bub. The clown's pancake make-up soon ran in rivulets of shit and Noxzema: it looked like Bub was weeping tears of monkey poop.

Bub sagged. This was it. The End. How could he carry on when even the simplest of his plans was soon turned to dog-food by the selfish, stupid chimps? How could he hang his head high when his primate roomates made every attempt at clown class end in crap? He needed to change...everything. The shrimp bucket had long since melted into a galvanized pail of rust. The tiny executive had not made a courtesy call in over a fortnight. The members of the club ignored Bub's attempts at chivalry. The Mayor had refused his request to upgrade his status. Life sucked. If he wasn't cleaning the members' balls, then he was sucking at the wizened teat of Old Man Moira.

Bub heard a group of golfers heading toward the caddyshack. He assumed they were soon going to hammer on the screen door and make some annoying request. Bub knew that he had to make a decision. Face (poop-smeared or not) the golfers or sneak out the back door and run like a bandit. Bub peeped through the window to see four plaid-clad golfer in flat caps, raccoons in hand, mounting the sagging porch. The raccoons slept peacefully in the golfers' arms. Their light snoring blending with the wind whipping through the dwarf maples. Bub understood that the napping raccoons meant nothing but trouble and more of it for everyone. He made up his mind. He quickly wiped a polka-dotted sleeve across his face, grimaced a threat to the chimps, dropped all his belongings on the floor, and made a bolt for the back door. The repeated bang-bang of the golfers at the screen door was the last thing Bub remembered as he ran head-first into Pete Trousers, the club's golf pro.