Tribute by Tom Weaver

By Weaver

This fat guy, wearing mauve Capri pants and a sombrero was chasing me on roller skates. I was on foot; he had the roller skates, just to clear things up. What made this weird, if not the idea of me being hunted by such a person was strange enough, was that we were traversing through patches of grass and up cement steps in an unfamiliar college campus-like setting. The fact that he was shirtless didn't bother me, somehow.

I could hear the smooth humming of his well-greased ball bearings when he found a stretch of ground to glide upon getting closer and closer to me as I continued to run. I had no idea where I was looking to for safe haven, as I was in unfamiliar territory.

As luck would have it, the endless, flat and smooth cement sidewalk turned on me, if by nothing but the fact that I was running on it. The man chasing me neared to the point that I could hear his heavy breathing and smell the briny sweat that I imagine was vomiting from every pore of his leathered skin. Confused, defeated and exhausted, I stubbornly slowed to a stop, which caught my friend of guard a bit, as he passed by me in glorious shock. He had some minor difficulty braking with the worn rubber stoppers on the toes of his roller skates. He spastically tiptoed while simultaneously performing a 180 until he became static. This maneuver would receive perhaps a 2 or 2.5 from the majority of the judging panel had they been there. The French judge would have given him a solid 1. Damn French.

"What do you want?!" I viciously spewed as I put up an invisible shield that feigned impenetrability.

Catching his breath, the fat man stuck out his chubby hand, which was holding a small wicker basket, apparently containing little bottles of something. "Are you into hot sauces, man?" he asked, pronouncing "man" more like "mang".

Where the hell was this going, I thought. I shook my head and waved my hands in a way that I hoped he would comprehend that I was oblivious to what he said and/or meant. "Sure. Why in the world do you ask?" I mentally slapped myself on the side of the head as soon as the words came out of my mouth.

With a wide smile, fatty replied, "Because I have a collection of hot sauces that I made, and would like to see if you want some."

"When does anyone really need hot sauce, pal?"

"But these are special ones, man, really." What a salesman. "If you'll just take a look, really fast", he pretty much begged.

"Hurry up. And why are they so special?" I need to keep my mouth closed.

The Corpulent One swiftly pulled out three bottles of hot sauce, each a different shade of sauce than the other. Looking pumped in a "I just blew up the Death Star" kind of way, he knocked me over when he said, "These are my Def Leppard tribute sauces! Look see? I have Pyromania..." (He showed a bottle labeled with the Union Jack over top some fire) ...Change Of Spots... (really stretching there with the leopard/Leppard semantics) ...and One Armed Bandit!" (He had their drummer in a devil suit and a Lone Ranger mask eating a hard taco).

I was frozen in place with absolutely nothing to respond with. All I could see was his teeth. They were stained orange, most likely from eating all of his profits. His hands were seen shaking out of the corner of my eye. I could see the cheap labels peeling off at the sides and the spicy liquid splashing within the bottles. This fat man wanted nothing more in this world than to sell me a bottle of his product. It was almost sweet and endearing, to be honest.

"Let me see one," I said after letting out a perturbed sigh. He handed me a bottle of "Bandit", to which I opened and took a whiff. Strong stuff it was, and pretty much exactly what I was looking for. Seeing my reaction to the strength of the sauce, my buddy smiled at me with his Tang powder pearls and nodding happily. I took the opened bottle and doused his eyes with his own wares, immediately sending him to his knees in a shriek of torment and confusion.

"Def Leppard sucks!" I hollered into his ear right before I got the hell out of there.

2 Comments

| Leave a comment

Whoa.

Quite a punch line. Reminds me of something the Soda Jerks characters would do.

Leave a comment

Entry Archives

About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by Weaver published on April 28, 2005 10:43 AM.

Recently Added to the Archives was the previous entry in this blog.

My internal monologue while surfing the web and learning about a Chinese restaurant exhibit now being shown in New York; after drinking one Diet Coke, one Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper, and one Almond Roca Latte, by Ed Darrin is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.