Fraters Libertas

As Thick As A Whale Omelette

I usually don't explain the titles to my posts. If you all can't make the effort to be as culturally aware as I am, I ain't going to make the effort to awareitize you. However, due to the sheer volume of emails regarding the title to yesterday's post on Christmas tree erecting (stop that giggling, you kids...I'm looking in your direction, JB!) I feel an explanation is in order.

The title came from an episode of The Simpsons. It's a cartoon that has been running on Fox for almost 16 years now. I'm sure some of you have heard of it. In this particular episode, Homer (he's the dad) is building a barbecue pit in his backyard.

To help illustrate the hilarity that I was trying to recreate, let's join The Simpsons Archive's description of a scene from that episode, already in progress:

(W)ith the concrete foundation for the barbecue pit done, Homer brushes off his hands. He then takes over the construction job from Lisa (Homer's daughter), who's the one who had been working. Homer picks up the box to admire what the finished product should look like. Then the bottom of the box opens and the contents drop into the wet cement. Homer quickly removes the stuff and puts it on top of a wheelbarrow full of bricks. The wheelbarrow tips over, spilling everything in the cement. Homer curses Lisa, then sets out to build the whole thing before the cement dries. He finds the instructions, but the English side is covered with cement, so he looks at the French side and can't figure that out either. And so, Homer frantically cements together whatever he happens to grab.

Later, Homer marvels at one perfectly built barbecue pit. He puts down the box and sees his pile of parts. "Why doesn't mine look like that?!" he hollers. He picks up a crowbar and starts beating on the junk pile in a fit of rage.

Next comes one of the funniest lines ever uttered by a balding, overweight, yellow cartoon character in the history of balding, overweight, yellow cartoon characters. Just before he attacks the pile of stupidity that was supposed to be his barbecue pit with an umbrella, Homer screams:

Why?! Why must life be so hard? Why must I fail at every attempt at masonry?

Every time I hear it, I bust out laughing...and that's what I thought all you people would do when I placed it atop my latest literary masterpiece. It seems I've misjudged you folks since all it has seemed to accomplish is to clog my email box with puzzled queries about my perceived misunderstanding of the word "masonry".

Perhaps I should have replaced the word "masonry" with "tree erecting"...but I felt that would have detracted from the line's potency.

Perhaps I should have used Homer's line "Why doesn't mine look like that?!" as my title...but I felt there was too much ambiguity in that quote when it was removed from context.

No, I think the problem is that you people need to spend a little less time reading blogs and a little more time watching television. Nevertheless, I'm terribly compunctuous to have caused you all such pericumbobulation. It shall never happen again...not even interfrastically.