Tuesday 31 January 2012

Concise History of the World Chapter 2

Welcome back class

Eventually there was man among the critters on earth.

Life was a bit wearisome until they began spotting each other instead of just pacing around not doing much except maybe drinking alone. It was more rewarding when the other human was, well, constructed a bit differently. It would soon become even more so for roughly half of the critters, those that love to talk.

The difference was the coming of language. Before that it was hard to deliver a good pick-up line, even for the forward thinkers who had those. As centuries went by the language got better but the lines didn’t.

The first language was ‘Stone’, which is why they call it the Stone Age. A lot can be expressed with a stone. Properly aimed it can deliver a clear message. It did however leave something to be desired in interpersonal relationships. Pick up lines were still scarce, though sometimes the goal was achieved once she regained consciousness. Sometimes she carried a grudge and things didn’t work out. (I've got a headache.) There are some who believe this practice is the historical root of the term ‘Pickup Line’

Before long things improved with the advent of  Rock, Hide, Knife, the new language which ushered in the age of negotiation. The only problem was that poor negotiators often reverted back to ‘Stone’. That led to a short era of Slingshot, Leather Spitwad, Dagger which did not work out that well, especially for those who chose Spitwad.

With the advent of closer association between humans of all kinds of things changed dramatically. Occasional grunts and farts when they were together developed into more advanced languages. The first true language can’t be identified, since writing was a still a bit heady for the local population. We are pretty sure they eventually settled on one or they wouldn’t have been able to build cities.

Build them they did. One of the first they name Babel. God only knows why they chose the name.

Things went well in the city, demonstrating the value of a common language. Quite a few of them began talking about philosophy and they agreed that there was a god and that He lived somewhere in the sky. After a few too many drinks they decided to build a tower so that they could drop by and visit Him.

Though the work was going well there were occasions when the brickwork teetered and collapsed. They might have given up if one smart fellow hadn’t invented a cementing mixture using saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal.

Coincidently another smart fellow invented something for the workers to do while they were on break. His timing was poor. It came after the tower was well underway, reaching WAY WAY UP. His invention was the cigarette. During the first break when the new invention was tried an additional characteristic of the blackish cement became evident.

The explosion was tremendous, even waking up God who found he had a lot of new visitors despite the disappearance of the tower. Survivors were scattered to all parts of the land.  Regaining consciousness many felt that there were not sufficient words in their language to express their thoughts so they invented new ones. Most of those were related to pain and anger. By the time they stopped using those, they had forgotten all of the rest of the words of the common language. They were somewhat speechless until they invented new words for the old thoughts. Many of the first were needed for pickup lines.

Now, when they met, they ran into that old failure to communicate thing. That led to war. That and competition in the romance department did anyway. This sorrowful condition lasted until English was invented. With that once again came world peace, with the exception of an argument or two per generation.

Your homework, class, is to use language and come up with some new pick-up lines. Please do not discuss these among yourselves. Just turn your papers in to me the next time we meet. Those who drop them by my office before then may earn extra credit if they are any good.

1 comment:

  1. About that homework. Does it have to be in English, or can I write it in Grunt'nfart?

    ReplyDelete