Earl and Nigel, separately, would sit on their front porches and scowl. As the world would go by before them, they could not muster a smile, instead, they chose to find regret and fault in everything before them. The postman was too fat to deliver their power bills with a spring in his step. Fault! The new family across the street had a juvenile person who would sing like murder in the shower. Fault! And as for the sparrows, they couldn’t even manage to catch the worm which was wriggling now on one of the man’s driveways. Fault!
It was the time of year when choruses were singing, ‘Peace on Earth’ and the pulpit was preaching, ‘Love is born’. And it was then the first miracle of the season happened: Earl got up from his chair without a single curse word. He ambled over to his side fence, where he called out to Nigel with an edge of bitterness in his voice, ‘You coming over later?’ The question itself may have seemed quite neighbourly, but the two had been feuding for years. Sometimes they would feud over sprinklers, or the shadows their houses would cast on the other’s property. Sometimes they would quarrel over smells which would waft from one kitchen window to the next, and there was that one time, many years ago now before Nigel’s knees would click, that he had peed on one of Earl’s rose bushes.
But as for Earl’s question, the answer did not need to be asked, as Nigel’s distrust and dislike of his neighbour meant he would always be answering in the affirmative. It was therefore all down to the timing. He had been watching a particularly informative documentary on ants, and the next instalment was set to air on the television that night. With that in mind, he called back, ‘I’ll be ‘round about six thirty’.
It was then that the second miracle of the season occurred: Earl back inside his house to sort out dinner, and he had exactly two microwave dinners left in his freezer. With dinner resolved, he took out an old rolling pin from the third drawer, covered it in tin foil and stuck it upright in a pot of dirt which had long-since housed a small plant, which had slowly succumb to death from lack of water – all life now wilted, it was the perfect place to stick the pole. He moved the pot to the centre of his table and with decorations sorted, he made himself a cup of coffee and waited for Nigel to arrive.
On making his way over to Earl’s house, Nigel quite deliberately walked through a muddy patch of dirt, and on entering his house, did not remove his shoes. He sat down at the kitchen table and with a familiarity that years of tradition had instilled, waited without speaking to be served his meal. The pair had little in the way of niceties to exchange, and so as the microwave bolognaise was dumped on the table, Nigel began, ‘You need to learn to salt the food you serve’.
And then, for the first time in many weeks, Earl smiled, ‘On February 12th your car brakes squealed and woke me up’. Nigel learned into the conversation, ‘On March 9th you leered at me from over the fence, and your ugly nearly sent me to my grave’. Earl responded, ‘On April 21st, you left your garden hose on and a trickle of water came onto my property’. From there, the name calling escalated – one called the other a ‘Goose’, then a ‘Clown’, then this evolved to become the ‘Ringmaster of the fools’, and so on.
As the meal came to its conclusion, and the name calling and sharing of grievances reached its height, the men got up from their seats and demanded of each other to, ‘take off your girly pants and prove you’re a man’. It would have been a cryptic phrase for any guests to that house, but they both knew this was an invitation to wrestle. To wipe the proverbial slate clean and to start counting grievances anew. Neither man had much speed, and as if in slow motion, they approached each other with arms outstretched before both tumbled to the floor. The match from the previous year was still in Earl’s mind – Nigel had used his elbow to pin his chest to the floor, and this year, Earl was determined for this not to happen again. And then, as the pair regained some composure after their fall – Nigel was pinning Earl to the floor with his elbow on his chest. Earl groaned and the men rose again to their feet, using the furniture about them to prop themselves up and certainly not helping the other.
Once upright, Nigel returned to the kitchen table feeling confident in his demonstration of strength, and Earl put the kettle on. The pair would have their customary coffee and contemplate silently the misery that the season offered them both. It was then that the third miracle occurred: Earl found two clean mugs! Returning to the table, the pair sat in silence and sipped their coffee, until Nigel had reason to anger, ‘Stop slurping your coffee’. The pair looked each other in the eye and both nodded in agreement; this had been a truly splendid Festivus.
Epic that of noting with date the offenses of the year ☺️👏🏼 magnificent story. As always delighted to read your story.
🎆🎇🎉🎊🌧️💐✨🌾🌱🌹🌙🌿🍃🥀⚡🌺☘️🍀🌈🌷⭐🪴🌵🌸🌟💮🌴🌳💫☀️💮☔🌲🌳🌍🌌🌠☄️🏵️🐝🌻🌼🍄🐞🦋💙☕💜🍍🎆🎇🎉🎊🎆🎇🎉🎊🌧️💐✨🌾🌱🌹🌙🌿🍃🥀⚡🌺☘️🍀🌈🌷⭐🪴🌵🌸🌟💮🌴🌳💫☀️💮☔🌲🌳🌍🌌🌠☄️🏵️🐝🌻🌼🍄🐞🦋💙☕💜🍍🎆🎇🎉🎊
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Excellent story. TV dinners are the perfect Festivus food. Nice choice.
Festivus as a holiday definitely seems suited for old men as well. 😂
Old men? As a man in my middle 30s, I think I'll happily claim Festivus as a holiday for those pushing middle age. Bah, humbug!
Haha yeah, I suppose I'm the same.
I actually new a guy that put up a pole each year for Festivus. I think that's all he did though. 😂
Hello dear friend, I really enjoyed reading your masterful way of narrating the facts with precise and picturesque details such as noting the dates of the problems, plus no doubt this holiday serves to amuse everyone with your particular vision of the matter. Great story. A hug.
Happy Christmas back. Hope you are on holidays already?
Holidays... the dream! Our final day with students is tomorrow (15th) then we have staff days until the 20th! So not quite there yet. That said, because my teaching load is 0.6 - and with Year 10 and Year 12 out, I've been down to 8 periods a fortnight (Just Year 11). I guess when you think of it like that, I've been on holidays for weeks ;)
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Well done Tim 👍
A brilliant story with great details, which made it super interesting and realistic.
You surely make me want to celebrate this holiday over Christmas 😂
Heya Milly;
I watched Seinfeld through once, many, many, many years ago. I don't recall Festivus at all, but it felt consistent with the show. Very glad to have found it though, and am rather looking forward to the 23rd now. Happy Festivus to you!
🤣 Hilarious. Earl and Nigel find fault with everything it seems. Such kerfuffle over meaningless things. They both need a life. Happy Festivus. 😊😊
Brilliant as always :)
It's lucky for Festivus, or those two would have quite a list of grudges to take to their neighboring graves!
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Lets keep the momentum going my brotha. These low prices and holiday season is hitting us. Lets rockin Like Earl n Nigel
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Heya Quackers;
I've decided to take a bit of a different approach; over the last few days I came to realise that in 2023, I want more time. The only way for me to do that is to step back from being on Hive - so I'm using this slump in the price of hive to basically dump everything and sell-out. Over the past few days, I nearly got down to nothing left in terms of my splinterlands cards. In fact, I had 3 cards total - but I just sent you one of my favourites! The Silvershield Assassin! I can't believe you play WILD but don't own it. A double strike with poison - come on, it'll be your new favourite go-to card ;) (Or if you hate it, it's a $30 price tag at the moment, but I had it up for a few days and it didn't sell).
The timing of the Hive-quitting is going to coincide with my holidays - they start today and run until end of January. I really don't want to spend so much time on my screen - and I rather think that will end well for me. From just about every room in our house you can see the ocean, as far as alternates go, perhaps I'll be at the beach! I also read in the paper the other day questions about Binance's long term prospects - and I thought, 'Shit, just what the crypto space needs'. This was timed with the introduction of Runi's into Splinterlands - which were basically unbeatable, throw in the land project and the new rebellion set coming out - I guess I thought to myself: do I play and keep paying and paying and paying, or do I get out before I find myself in that giant sink-hole, continually chasing better decks etc.
Speaking of that house, I'm just using all my hive assets to dump on the mortgage. It has been creating a decent dint. We have a fixed rate that will expire to, then our interest rate jumps up to 4.7% (assuming it don't go any higher) and we still owe $550,000 on the place. In total, I think my cash out will be about 1% or a bit over it, of that figure - which, let's be honest, ain't too bad a sum to knock off. In that sense, I guess Hive has worked out for me (I havn't wanted to look how much I spent on Splinterlands, only to have card values fall. Perhaps the blogging side of it at least made me do a little better than break even).
But otherwise quackers, will leave it there. I have a 4 week unstaking of sps and gls, and another 3 weeks of unstaking on my main hive pile. Then the next annoying bit - will have about 1000 hive that I'll need to go through the full 13 week unstaking process with. To that end, I'll be around to cash out, but not really here for much else.
Take care, good luck with that debt pile of yours - I hope that Hive goes to the moon for you.
Hey Tim!
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We trust that all is well with you, and that the season has brought you much joy:)))
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Hello Timothy!
We trust that you're doing well.
Wishing you a happy new year, and all the best wishes for 2023.
Howdy to my coffee loving gang, @cinnccf!
Thanks for checking in, in truth, I feel like I'm doing rather well.
I made it my new years resolution to spend less time in front of the screen and more time outside and in books. The biggest taker of my time? All things Hive (which included some of the games on the blockchain). So I have put myself in 'pause' mode in regards to the old blogging in order to get some of the other priorities in my life right.
So far, it's working out great! I miss the connections, of course, but the benefits outweigh the negatives. (And, even though the price of hive is quite low, cashing out certainly helped the old mortgage too).
Oh, dearest Tim,
We will definitely miss reading your stories and seeing you around the blockchain in general. However, we can't fault your plans and the changes that you have for this new year.
Thank you for responding, and we wish you the very best in all that you do.
Hive will always be here, and you are always welcome here at Cinnamon Cup Coffee at any time. 🤗😍