SCOTT BRADFIELD

DAZZLE REDUX

DESPITE ALL THE BURRS and bad weather, Dazzle lived a good life in the woods. He
ate plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables, learned to take one day at a time, and
raised the gangly pups of his common-law wife Edwina with as much genuine
affection as if they were his very own. There were times, however, when Dazzle
found that being a decent father figure took more patience than he could muster.
And no matter how hard he tried to restrain himself, he couldn't stop telling
everybody what to do.

"No, no, no," Dazzle told the twins for about the zillionth time that morning.
"Let's try it again, okay? This is a rectangle. This is a rhomboid. And this is
a circle." Dazzle sketched the shapes in the powdery red dirt as he spoke them,
trying to show the twins that geometry was as graspable as any bone, stick or
rock. "Okay, Heckle, let's pretend I've sent you on a top-secret assignment.
You're supposed to go down to the Land of Men and bring me a Frisbee. Have you
got that, Heckle? Do you know what a Frisbee is?"

Heckle, who had been warming his cold nose under the nippled convexity of sister
Jeckle's gravid belly, sat up with a start. He licked his wet lips hungrily.

"Just show me that Frisbee," Heckle snapped. "I'll whip that sucker out of the
sky, no problem."

"Okay, boy," Dazzle continued. "Now take a deep breath and look at the three
shapes I've drawn. And tell me -- which one's the shape of a Frisbee? Show me
the circle. The circle is the shape of a Frisbee. Point to the circle and you
win the game."

Dazzle spoke evenly in short compact sentences, as if he were marking a trail
with bright red beads. But no matter how clearly Dazzle pointed the way, Heckle
never managed to keep up for very long.

"A circle is like a Frisbee?" Heckle wondered out loud, mewling and starting to
twitch. "But not a Frisbee, really? A circle's a space on the ground when a
Frisbee's not there? So what the hell do I want with a circle, anyway? Why can't
I have a Frisbee instead?"

"You're thinking too hard, Heckle," Dazzle warned. "Relax, take a deep breath,
and point to the circle. You can do it, boy. So do it for me now."

"This is not the Frisbee!" Heckle declared with a pounce. "Here it's not! This
isn't it here!" Heckle was so slavery with confusion he looked as if he had just
chewed a frog. Within moments he had pawed the rhomboid completely out of
existence -- both metaphorically and literally.

Times like this Dazzle felt like wandering down to PCH and hurling himself under
the first eighteen-wheeler that came along.

"Not quite, Heckle," Dazzle pronounced finally, with all the parental patience
he could muster. "But at least you pointed to a geometric figure, and not a dead
beetle like last time. So what say we sleep on it, and take another shot in the
morning. As I've told you before --Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals wasn't
written in one day."

"Maybe I'm not all I should be in the Family Skills Department," Dazzle
confessed that night to his erstwhile mate, Edwina. "But getting through to
those kids of yours is like having a conversation with a block of wood, I swear.
If I try to instruct them in the most basic math and science skills, they're not
interested. If I try to teach them which way to look when crossing the street,
they're still not interested. If I try to point out the most obvious cultural
contradictions of multinational capitalism, why, forget about it. They're really
not interested. If you can't eat it or fuck it, it's not important, that's their
attitude. And you want to know what pisses me off most? They just may be right.
Maybe fucking and eating really are the ne plus ultra of canine development. And
in the long run of history, I'm the biggest boob in town."

Dazzle's mate Edwina was a pretty faithful bitch (at least since menopause,
anyway) and had long provided Dazzle everything he considered crucial to a
long-term relationship. She never questioned his judgment. She rarely bit him
hard enough to draw blood. And she never once kicked him out of bed for snoring.
At the same time, though, Edwina wasn't the sort of dog who knew how to hold up
her end of a conversation. In fact, whenever Dazzle started pouring out his most
heartfelt anxieties, she promptly curled into a fetal ball and fell fast asleep.

"Growwwl," Edwina muttered, while the whites of her eyes flickered out the weird
morse of dreams. "Wolves aren't welcome 'round these parts. And neither are you
mailmen."

Nevertheless, Dazzle found something infinitely comforting about a good night's
sleep with Edwina. Her ambient heat soothed the knots in his shoulders, and her
inattention dissolved the perplexities in his brain. As a result, Dazzle awoke
every morning filled with fresh intentions and resolve.

"I'm going to be more understanding and thoughtful," Dazzle would assure
himself, performing his ablutions in the piney-smelling creek. "And I won't be
so quick to lose my temper, either." But once Dazzle had shaken himself dry with
a few soul-rattling shivers and climbed back up the flinty hill, his resolutions
always vanished with the breeze. He saw his lazy foster progeny licking
themselves around the extinguished campfire. He smelled the unburied heaps of
sour bones and dead mice. And he heard the casual yips of random lovemaking fill
the rough-hewn settlement with a sort of ambient hum. ("Roll over, sweetheart,"
or "You kids go chase a gopher or something. Mum and Dad need a little alone
time -- dig?") If there was one thing that really got Dazzle's dander up, it was
watching his fellow dogs take the best things in life for granted, such as
liberty, well-stocked provisions, and properly functioning reproductive organs.
Perhaps this was because Dazzle had to work hard making it possible for his
extended-family members to never have to work too hard for themselves. Or
perhaps it was because when Dazzle was little, a hasty vet lopped his balls off
with a scalpel.

"Come on, guys!" Dazzle barked. "Wake up and smell the coffee, will you? You
can't lie around in your own filth all day, sniffing your smelly scrotums. Here,
why don't I show you grandpups how to build a fire, or gather blueberries, or
even compose a sestina. I mean, what good is all this free time if you don't
know how to use it? And you, Heckle, don't try skulking into those bushes. I
want you to sit down right this minute and draw me a parabola. You're gonna
learn your basic geometry, pal, or my name ain't Dazzle the Dog."

EVENTUALLY, DAZZLE got himself so wound up that none of the other dogs would
talk to him. The males wouldn't sniff the trees he pissed on. The bitches
wouldn't roll over submissively when he sauntered by for a chat. And even the
chirpiest grandpups wouldn't sport playfully with him in the dewy grass, since
they knew that even when Dazzle pretended to be fun-loving, he was almost always
nursing yet another endless lecture on one of his favorite topics, such as "Why
Dogs Shouldn't Eat Their Own Vomit," or "How Will Humans Ever Respect Dogs If
Dogs Never Respect Themselves?" In fact, the only dog who could bear Dazzle's
company anymore was Edwina. And this was because Edwina never stayed awake long
enough to figure out what Dazzle was trying to say.

"I know I don't talk much about my family," Dazzle confessed to her one night in
a whisper. "But maybe I should, since sometimes I feel it's my dead history that
keeps holding me back. I mean, if my old man hadn't pissed off when I was born,
I might have learned a little something about being a good dad myself. Instead,
I'm always trying to overcompensate. To be better, to act wiser, to prove myself
more dependable and trustworthy than some guy I never knew. I guess what I'm
trying to say, honey, is that the ones who suffer most for my screwed-up
family-history are the pups and grandpups. And they're not even the ones I'm mad
at. The one I'm really mad at is myself."

Over succeeding days and weeks, Dazzle tried counting to ten, positive thinking,
and just plain walking away. But no matter how hard he tried to restrain
himself, he couldn't seem to go ten minutes without bossing his fellow dogs into
a tizzy. Pretty soon the role of benevolent despot became as confining to Dazzle
as any basement garage or backyard fence. And Dazzle, who couldn't bear the
notion that he might be denying anybody (especially himself) true freedom,
decided it was time to take another trip into the world.

"Basically," Dazzle told his assembled foster progeny on the day he departed for
L.A., "I want you guys to stick together until I get back. Try not to eat so
much red meat, keep an eye on your crazy Mom, and don't let the pups go wild on
you. Jeckle, stop hanging with coyotes. Stan, if you took a bath every few days
or so, that rash of yours would clear up, no problem. And if for some reason I
don't return from this ridiculous quest of mine, I want you all to know that I
love you, and I'm sorry if I've been a temperamental old cuss the last few
months or so. I guess there're still a few things I need to figure out in my
life, and if I don't figure them out now, I probably never will. Oh, and one
last thing. I've hidden the Cheetos under a blue log by the river, so do me a
favor, will you --"

But before Dazzle could deliver his final instructions, the entire assembled
clan of fosterpups and grandpups took off in one shaggy collective flash. They
didn't even pause long enough to woof good-bye. They just disappeared over the
first low rise and were gone.

Dazzle tried not to feel hurt or disappointed. Dogs, after all, were dogs. And
by their very nature, dogs would do anything for a Chee-to.

"Try to save a few till I get back," Dazzle concluded softly through the
swirling haze of dandruffy dog hairs. "Name-brand snack food doesn't grow on
trees."

"I guess I'm what you'd call your basic stay-at-home individual," Dazzle's dad
confessed on the morning his estranged son appeared on his doorstep. "I like to
sleep every night on the same blanket, make my daily rounds pissing on the same
posts, and pretty much eat out of the same garbage cans every day of my
existence. And with the exception of the occasional bitch in heat that staggers
my way, I consider the high point of my life to be a really good bowel movement.
Rock hard, intact, clean cut at both ends. I mean, what else is there? Sure, I
sowed my share of wild oats in my day. But now I just want to be left alone to
my memories, my naps, and my unbelievably pleasurable flatulence. Which, by the
way, brings me to my next point, Mr. Doozle. Or did you say your name was
Dizzle?"

"Dazzle," Dazzle replied weakly, trying not to look hurt.

"Whatever. Way I look at it, see, is maybe you could step back from my doorway
just a tad. And pardon my involuntary growl -- it's just I've got this weird
territorial thing about my front stoop. Not that I actually doubt your claim of
kinship, mind you. But turn around slowly, that's it, and keep your paws where I
can see them ...."

Times like this, Dazzle didn't feel embarrassed for himself. He felt embarrassed
for his entire canine species.

"Ah yes," Dazzle's dad said, sniffing around in his son's private parts like a
pig rooting out truffles. "That's definitely a smell I recognize. And yes.
That's a smell I recognize, too."

"Things happened at the pound, Pop. You never gave me a chance to explain."

But of course it was already too late. Dazzle's dad emitted an abrupt snort of
amazement and fell back, plop, onto his gray flat haunches. His ice-cold
nostrils flared.

"Jesus Christ, son. Somebody's chopped off your balls!"

Dazzle sighed with a sad little shiver.

"Tell me about it," Dazzle said.

Pop invited Dazzle to spend the night in his sheltered alleyway outside a
condemned Pizza Hut, and even offered to share some of his moldier blankets and
food-stuffs. But he refused to acknowledge any moral responsibility for Dazzle's
life. Or manifest the slightest degree of remorse.

"One thing I simply won't allow," Pop said, "and that's for you to make me feel
bad about myself. Life's a mess, whichever way you look at it, and us dogs got
to do anything necessary to get by. Sometimes it means sucking up to human
beings. Other times it means turning our backs on one another. In a better
world, son, sure, I'd have stuck around, taught you a few things, provided for
you and your sisters the best I knew how. But the world doesn't always allow us
to do what we're supposed to. Sometimes we have to settle for what we must do
instead."

All his life, Dazzle had considered language a means of opening up new vistas.
It came as quite a surprise, then, to learn how effectively it could be deployed
as a form of embargo. Especially if you were as good at it as Dazzle's dad.

"So why didn't you keep an eye on us, Pop?" Dazzle asked his father from time to
time. "We were right down the street, living in a hole Mom dug behind the Lucky
Market. Ail you had to do was walk down the street and say hello."

Dazzle's dad issued sighs like exclamations. He wasn't trying to make points,
exactly. Instead, he was expressing the hard, breathy futility of saying
anything at all.

"Your mom didn't want me around, sport. It would only have upset her."

"But what about after Mom went away? Why didn't you come visit then?"

"Because by that point you didn't want to see me anymore. And besides, I'd taken
up with this wild bitch from Vanowen. You wouldn't have wanted me to abandon my
responsibilities to her, now, would you?"

Sometimes, when Dazzle's inquiries grew a little bristly, Pop would shut off
every avenue to discourse with a generic injunction. "No use rehashing the same
refried beans," Pop would say. Or even: "Why don't we get some sleep and talk
about it in the morning."

Dazzle's dad had grown so radically dissociated from his own feelings over the
years that he didn't have any idea what terrible shape he was really in. He
rarely bathed or picked up after himself. He ate nothing but day-old junk food
foraged out of back alley bins. And he never listened to a single word anybody
tried to tell him, especially if it might do him a world of good.

Every morning Dazzle's dad woke with the dawn, lapped dirty water from a blocked
drain, and set off for his diurnal scrounge through the neighborhood alleyways.
Meanwhile, Dazzle trailed along dutifully like a cynical Boswell.

"Well, what have we here," Dazzle's dad would proudly proclaim, as if he had
just discovered the Northwest Passage, or a cure for distemper. "Looks to me
like a good-sized chunk of a Double-Bacon-Cheeseburger, still with a few crispy
fries attached to this melted cheese here, mmm. And if I remember correctly,
son, you said we shouldn't even look in this can, right?"

Or: "Let's face it. Dogs are stupid and human beings aren't. That's why dogs
live in ditches and eat garbage, and human beings live in classy homes, and can
visit the McDonald's drive-thru any damn time they please. I'm not trying to
blow my own trumpet, kid, but you and I are rocket scientists compared to your
normal breed of dog. So complain all you want about my lousy child-rearing
techniques. Without my brains, you'd have ridden off with the first dogcatcher
that came along with a biscuit. Just like your poor stupid mom."

Or: "Let's wander past this empty lot for a moment and see...ah, there he is.
Inside that sewer drain resides Mad Dingo Dog, most completely unreasonable
animal creature I've ever met. Best if you stay out of this neighborhood
altogether, son. Lesson number one of urban living is don't worry about the
human beings. Instead, keep on the lookout for your fellow dogs."

Dear Edwina,

If you could read and I could write, I'd probably send you a letter much like
the one you're holding in your paws right now. Visiting Dad has turned out to be
a total bummer. In fact, I've never met anybody so shut down and disaffected in
my entire life. All Dad does these days is eat chocolate donuts, sleep, and
evade the local dogcatcher.

I hope everything is okay with you and the kids. I'd tell you to give everybody
my love, but knowing dogs, I'm pretty sure they've completely forgotten me now
that my rear isn't around to be sniffed. But despite my frequently cranky moods,
I want you to know that I really miss my life with you out there in the woods.
And I sincerely hope you'll all still be there when I get back.
Love,
Dazzle

Despite all his talk about/tee-thinking individualism, years of bad faith had
worn Pop's identity down to the nub. If he wasn't ranting about the SPCA or the
poor quality of corporate-produced fast-franchise donuts, he hardly had enough
energy left anymore to lick his own scrotum. There were times, in fact, when
Dszzle's dad lay motionless on the concrete floors of his apartment for hours,
just staring morosely at the cobwebby pointillism of dead flies on the wall.

"What's bothering you, Pop?" Dazzle would ask, testing his dad for movement the
same way curious children poke dead rabbits in the road with a stick. "What are
you thinking about? Want to let me in on the big secret, huh?"

"Nothing at all, son. Nothing I can't deal with, anyway."

"Don't you get lonely sometimes? Locked up in your own head like that?"

"Life is something you get through one day at a time, son. Stiff upper lip and
all that."

"Why don't you try talking about it, Pop? When I'm feeling blue, I talk to
Edwina and it helps. Even when she doesn't understand a single word I'm trying
to say."

"Talking about things doesn't make them better," Dazzle's dad replied simply,
closing his eyes and scratching serenely behind one ear. "Now if you don't mind,
I think it's time for my afternoon nap."

Some days Dazzle felt as if he were sniffing around the perimeter of a vast
black moat filled with man-eating crocodiles. In the center of the moat stood a
tall brooding castle, elaborate with Gothic figurines and hand-carved
paraphernalia. Dazzle knew his dad was standing in the middle of this castle,
waiting for someone to let him out. But it was impossible to let Dad out until
Dad showed Dazzle the way in. Dazzle's dad didn't seem to understand his
predicament one bit.

Then one afternoon Dazzle went for a lonely walk through the streets of his
remote, blissless puppyhood. Fences, walls, garbage bins, stray auto parts,
oil-stained asphalt, bricked-over windows and board-hammered doorways. So far as
Dazzle could figure, the civilized world was filled with tacky diversions that
led you places you didn't want to go. It was kind of like being lost in a maze
where all the avenues were rigged with electric wires-- zap, zap. Every choice
was a bad choice. And every bad choice led you to believe that it was all your
fault.

"Too much dualism," Dazzle decided, "can drive anybody nuts. Even a fairly
intelligent individual like Pop."

Eventually Dazzle found himself loitering outside the ramshackle, slanty hut of
Dad's weird neighbor, Mad Dingo Dog, and wondering if anybody was home. Dazzle
was beginning to miss the company of other dogs, even if they weren't especially
bright or loquacious. At least Edwina and the kids speak the truth as clearly as
their crude tongues allow, Dazzle reflected fondly. But these shutdown alpha
males like Pop, Jesus. Get me out of here.

Dazzle was so mired in his own disconsolate reflections that he didn't even
notice he was no longer alone. At first he felt hairs bristle on the nape of his
neck. Then, with an involuntary growl, he looked up.

Mad Dingo Dog had a warty, prolonged face, tufted with gray whiskers. He
squinted at Dazzle for a moment. Then took a perfunctory sniff at the
intervening air.

"Why, I'll be a pussy's uncle," Mad Dingo Dog exclaimed. "You smell just like my
long lost nephew, Dazzle!"

THE WEIRD THING was, Dazzle never even knew he had an uncle. And yet from the
moment they met, the two of them caught on like a house afire.

"Yeah," Mad Dingo Dog confessed, "your old man's a real piece of work. But one
thing's for certain -- he's always been real proud of you. `My son got himself
out of this rat-race,' he's always bragging. `My son was too good for this dump
so he split.' `My son this and my son that.' Jeez, the old fart never stops
talking about you. So what are you doing back in the Valley, for Christ's sake?
I heard you had your own condo in the woods, soapy hot tub and everything. And
you were running the world's first all-canine high-tech retail outlet, or
something crazy like that."

Hearing all this exaggerated gossip about himself made Dazzle feel meager by
comparison. After all, Dazzle didn't want to talk about himself. Dazzle wanted
to talk about him.

"Maybe I misunderstood what Dad was trying to say," Dazzle ventured after a
while. "But the way Dad tells it, he and I are the only halfway-intelligent dogs
on the entire planet. And you're this crazy, rabid guy who howls at the moon,
and keeps trying to steal all his best donuts."

Mad Dingo Dog couldn't help smiling. It resembled an allergic twitch.

"Yeah, well," Mad Dingo Dog concluded wistfully. "That certainly sounds like
your old man, now, doesn't it!"

By the time Dazzle returned to Dad's condemned basement, he found a dogcatcher's
van parked in the alley, and a pale, overweight dogcatcher leaning into Dad's
doorway with a Milk Bone dog biscuit.

"Come here, old soldier," the dogcatcher was saying, "and I'll take you to the
land of milk and honey. Free dog chow, plenty of furry friends to keep you
company, and at the end of the day, a bonus injection of this really fine
medication I've put aside especially for you. No more loneliness, bud. No more
wondering what it's all about. So come along, boy, that's a good dog, one more
step, then another. Come get your dog biscuit. Then I'll drive you to the pound
and teach you what real peace is all about."

In back of the idling white van a mangy assortment of alley strays were
scrambling all over one another trying to get out. They yelped and howled and
woofed and barked.

"Don't listen to him, guy!" an old gray bulldog cried, pawing the grated window.
"It's hell in here! The whole place smells like disinfectant, and there aren't
any decent places to go to the bathroom!"

Dazzle stood and contemplated this weird scenario for a moment. His dad, the
dogcatcher, strays in a van, and the hot Encino sun staring implacably down. He
could barely hear Dad's whisper through the distant swish of traffic on 101, but
even so, it registered clearly in Dazzle's brain. It was as if Dad weren't
responding to the dogcatcher at all. He was simply telling his son what both of
them needed to know.

"I don't want it to hurt," Dad whispered. His voice approached the inner doorway
of his hovel, but only his rubbery black nose peeped out. "I just want to go
somewhere I don't have to think or feel guilty. And where nothing that happens
is ever my fault."

"We'll give you oodles of peace and quiet, old boy," the dogcatcher replied
softly. He spoke with the glib confidence of a man who knew he was good at his
job. "We'll take you to a place where you don't have to think about anything
anymore."

"I thought I'd leave my apartment to my son. I don't think he wants me around
anyway. I'm not sure, but I think I'm starting to get on his nerves."

"It's time for the old to make way for the new, pal. You come with me and I'll
take care of everything."

For a brief moment, Dazzle thought Dad should make this particular decision for
himself. But at the same time, being a radical civil libertarian, Dazzle
couldn't stand to see the public service sector impinging on anybody's personal
freedom. So without a second thought, Dazzle snuck over to the municipal-issue
van, climbed into the driver's seat, and activated the emergency door-release
with his paw. Behind him in the crowded cabin, the hairy clamor ceased.

Then, with a faint clang, the rear doors swung miraculously open.

"I don't know about the rest of you guys," the bulldog interposed. "But I'm
outta here."

Wild dogs poured from the back of the van like marbles from the mouth of a jar,
ricocheting off one another in every direction. The dogcatcher was so startled
that he dropped his dog biscuit and banged his knee on the curb.

"Wait! Stop! Bad dog! Bad dog!" He was issuing shotgun proclamations and running
down the alley. Eventually he turned the far corner and disappeared.

"Bad dogs to you, maybe," Dazzle responded softly, to nobody but himself. "But
to my way of thinking, they're just doing what dogs gotta do."

That night, after a lackluster celebratory bash of chocolate donuts and Diet
Tab, Dazzle finally told his dissociative old dad the news.

"I'm sorry, Pop," he said, "but I can't stand to see you do this to yourself
anymore. I had these illusions, right, that maybe we'd reach some sort of
reconciliation, and you'd even come home with me to the woods. But I now realize
that you're so tied up in your endless routines and bad faith that you'll never
let go. So what I'll do, see, is tell your grandkids you died. I'll tell them
you sent your love, but that you rolled over and died shortly after I found you.
I'll tell them you got hit by a car, or developed lung cancer from the smog, or
got shot in the butt by some spoiled kid with a BB gun. I'll use you as an
example, Pop, of what urban America can do to a dog, and if we're lucky, maybe
none of our semi-progeny will ever stumble into this hell-hole you can't seem to
leave. I won't kiss you goodbye or anything, but just say thanks for your
hospitality and get my poor frazzled butt out of here. If I start now, I can
maybe hit Ventura by morning."

Dazzle finished having his say with an expiring sigh. Ahh, Dazzle thought. I
wasn't even angry or anything. I just had to tell him good-bye.

Dazzle's dad had been looking a little shaken since his encounter with the
dogcatcher, and he sat watching his son with a slightly cocked expression, as if
he heard tasty birds singing somewhere.

Dazzle had a tear in his eye as he went to the door. Over one shoulder he wore a
painstakingly adjusted backpack which contained a cheese sandwich, a stale jelly
donut, and a half-liter bottle of Evian.

"So what is it, Pop?" Dazzle asked his father at the verge of the weedy doorway.
"Am I taking off and you've got nothing to say?" Don't lose the moment, Pop.
I've lost a few moments in my life and I can promise you. You never get them
back."

Dazzle's dad considered. Then, for the first time in his life, he finally told
his son what was really on his mind.

"Grandkids?" Dazzle's dad said. "You never said anything about grandkids."

So Dazzle took his dad home to the high mountains, where they never exchanged
any true, heartfelt words ever again. After all, there's plenty of sunshine and
fresh air to keep you occupied in the mountains. And sometimes talk just gets in
the way of living.

"I guess I'll never be a perfect father," Dazzle confessed to Edwina one night,
gazing out at the sky littered with stars. "Or a perfect son, either, for that
matter. And when I die, there may not be another dog in the entire world who
knows how to light the evening fire, or record the day's events for posterity.
But history belongs to each generation to figure out for itself, so there's no
point in me getting all worked up about things I can't change. Sometimes, old
girl, a dog needs to stop wrestling with the world long enough to get on with
the simple fact of being. Like you and me, Edwina. Being together -- nose to
haunch and haunch to nose."

It was a miraculous summer that Dazzle would remember fondly all his life. The
pups grew progressively leaner, brighter and more independent. Brisk sea-winds
kept the white sun cool. And wild wolves occasionally drifted into the orbit of
their encampment, lured by aromas of toasted marshmallows and bitches in heat.
It was a summer of perfect somnolence and irreflection. Except, of course, when
it came to Dazzle's immutable dad.

"For crying out loud!" Dazzle's dad was often heard exclaiming through the warm,
fir-scented air. "It's a rhomboid, for Christ's sake! Don't you idiots know what
a rhomboid is?"

But of course it was one of the miracles of that particular summer that nobody
ever figured out what a rhomboid was. Nobody even cared.