Suggested Audio Banana Skin:

 

[1] Steelers Wheel “Stuck in The Middle With You”

[2] The Persuaders “Some Guys Have All The Luck”

 

Military term for an operation in which multiple things have gone wrong. Related to “SNAFU” (Situation Normal, All Fucked Up”) and “FUBAR” (Fucked Up Beyond All Repair)

 

Certain words just roll off the tongue without so much as a hitch. Ballbag is one, a brace of syllables which mesh like peas and carrots in a broth. Clusterfuck is another. Somebody very dear to Keeper held this particular term very close to their heart and used it to describe themselves and their clumsy nature. I had long been a fan but this gave it a new lease of life, suddenly I wanted to cram it into every sentence and name any subsequent pets after it as a mark of respect. Anyhoots it has been a few moons since it last received the run-out it richly deserves so I thought what better time or place then here with my beloved Grueheads. Let us enter the clusterfuck together.

I have been known to be rather ham-handed at times, a bungling klutz in the field possessing all the gracefulness of a heavy-handed tree-sloth and appalling hand-eye coordination to boot. That’s right I am one gangly assed clusterfucker when left to my own devices and think nothing of falling up the stairs or stubbing my toe on any overhanging obstructions placed in my proximity. It is like an art form to me and I take great pride in my moronic lack of awareness. Thus I feel at home with a dunce hat as it just fits my crown so snugly. One could stretch as far as saying I’m totally FUBAR as, should there be an antidote to my buttery fingers, then it certainly hasn’t hit the marketplace yet.

I’m comfortable with fucking the cluster, human error is such an adorable failing so long as we’re able to poke a little fun at ourselves from time to time. Any foible is comedy gold to happen as far as I’m concerned. I may not possess the steady aim to thread a camel through the eye of a needle but as long as I can shove it through crudely then it still reaches the other side, albeit minus its epidermis. I celebrate clodfulness in all its forms; Clouseau may not have been the most refined of private dicks but he was never less than a ball to be around. Just so happens, I keep my clown-shoes on-hand just in case of any opportunity for some good old clusterfuckery.

I’m not alone either. There are droves of like-minded nincompoops plying their trade in the field, misjudging their distances and knocking over hot beverages as though it were some kind of Olympic event. We’re mostly harmless and any danger caused by our lummox natures invariably falls back on our shoulders so you can’t blame us for having a little merriment with it can you? After all, who really wants to cruise through life without making one singular transgression en route? Not Keeper, I’m a bull in a china shop and proud of this mantle as smashing shit up is just so much cotton-picking fun.

There’s good reason why Stevie Wonder never gets to drink from the finest crockery but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a pile of ceramics on-hand to go Greek with, should he wish to ignore his own superstitious crooning and just let loose once in a while. George Bush may not still be afforded the entire United States to send to hell but I’m sure that in a padded chamber and under correct supervision, he’s still a mild heap of diversion. By the same token, Keeper would knit one hell of a lousy Cosby sweater but I could also knock up a delightful tower from stickle-bricks. Just keep me in the environment I’m best suited and don’t trust me with your bone china, and we’ll get along dandy.

This is the douche who managed to single-handedly burn down a liquor store at ten by knocking over a lit candle then electrocute himself in a Physics lecture soon after. Bad things have happened on occasion and because of me I might add. One hapless cyclist ended up with a mouthful of crushed granite after I careened a little too close for his own comfort on a busy roundabout. What was I saying about only being a threat to one’s self? Scrap that, I’m like a one man wrecking ball and should come with government warning. FUBAR would suit, slapped across my forehead for all to see, just to give folk a chance. I’m damaged goods, buckled like a busted tricycle, a real clusterfuck.

Contrary to belief, the clusterfuck doesn’t denote some kind of wild sexual blow out whereby keys are deposited in a bowl by the insertion point and that’s a missed trick if you ask me. “I’m here for the clusterfuck” would be met with rapturous applause I’m assured, much like Norm strolling into Cheers to a hero’s welcome, I vibe off the sheer thought of the adulation I could gather by making my entrance this way. Instead, I stumble down the bottom three steps, clatter in through the door and plummet face first into Cliff Clavin’s nut basket. It still gets the desired applause either way and I prefer my version to Norm’s.

I ask myself daily whether I’m actually certifiable and I never get a straight answer. I think maybe I feel sorry for me a little, don’t wish to hurt my own feelings. So I remain button-lipped, believing this to be best for all concerned. Problem being, I only end up blabbing to myself later making the whole affair as pragmatic as housing an ash tray on a rickshaw. I have become at ease with certain facts over the past year or so and one of these has been that I’m a whole cluster of fuck. As well as being vaguely unhinged, I’m the bag of dicks for whom safety scissors were invented and I’m okay with that. Reason being…I laugh at my ridiculous actions daily.

There seems to be this idiotic notion that it is best to obscure one’s weaknesses but I’m not a believer in this theory. Put them out there, don’t bottle it all up inside as it will all come out in the laundry anyhoots. If my tombstone should read “Here lies Keeper…one of life’s little clusterfucks” then I’ll take it over an unmarked grave. I wish my indiscretions to become public knowledge as a problem shared is one halved after all. So I shall just carry on stumbling if that’s alright by y’all. Thus, I shall end with another true grue story, an example of clusterfuckery in its infancy and a good indicator as to why you should never let Keeper loose in your attic.

Imbecile in The Attic

 

I was barely old enough to comb my pubic thatch, knee-high to a stunted pygmy, and tanked-up with testosterone which I had no idea how to discharge. My friend invited me and another dimwitted acquaintance into the uppermost tier of his domicile, where we planned to floss with fiber glass and search out old Harold Lloyd paraphernalia. It was all meant to be just a little bit of fun and, indeed it was, until such time as I lost my footing and plunged through the ceiling to my pal’s private quarters.

I dangled there for several minutes which seemed like hours as my frantic buddies fought down the guttural laughter and attempted to make best of a situation speedily going south. There were mere minutes on the clock before the scheduled return of “the parents” and we had some work afoot if we were to salvage this before the most almighty wrath was felt. The vacuum cleaner was first on the scene but, alas, it choked on the insulating fiber strewn all over his boudoir and gave up the ghost with a terminal splutter.

I wriggled free from my corkage and assisted in erecting the ultimate cover-up to make best of our bad situation. A poster of Bruce Lee, possibly larger than the great man himself, was tacked over the humongous fissure and this was made even more ludicrous by the fact it bowed under the weight and therefore still revealed the gargantuan ceiling cleft. If anything it placed neon lighting around it. Time was of the essence so myself and my partner in crime scattered, leaving my poor friend to bear our cross.

It didn’t work out on this occasion as he is intensely arachnophobic and spent a sleepless night fighting off all manner of abseiling creepy crawlies as they poured through the badly masked hollow and slid towards his horrified face via silken gossamer. Consequently he came clean and I kept a wide berth for a good few weeks afterwards until the dust had settled. See, even then I was a clusterfuck in training. I would love to report that there is hope for me but, alas, saving yourself may be the only option now. I was born a clusterfuck, have existed for forty years fucking clusters at every turn, and will likely die as a result of a discarded banana skin or random roller boot. My dear grandmother taught me never to discard the bright side and at least I’m not Justin Bieber. Now there’s one cluster I’d simply love to fuck only I’d do so with an orally administered fist and would never call him afterwards. Now, if you’ll excuse me, my toaster appears jammed and I need to trigger its mechanism somehow. Where did I leave my butter knife?

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