Unfinished and Untitled...

... and if you're capable of completing the first paragraph/sentence without first poking both your eyes out with an icepick, you'll understand why. I don't really know why I do this, it really shows very little regard for my readers' sensibilities and even less for the 'rules' of good writing. I am, at my lowest common denominator, a pusillanimous reprobate incapable of even a modicum of respect for others, a low-grade fever, a contemptible pustule filled with bilious vitriol. And those are my good points...

Once upon a time, in a land that never really existed but I wish it did because it would make it far easier to provide details in a story rather than pulling them out of my ass and just hoping that they might sound conceivable to a discerning potential reader, there lived a loosely-bound group of genetically-linked hominids capable of most all the mental and physical characteristics available to other members of their species, but who, through eons of diligence and practice, became specialized with speech patterns emphasizing broad speculative interpretations of available data interspersed with factoids only peripherally aligned with any subject being discussed, resulting in overly-long, nearly-imperceptible, exhaustingly-inarticulate sentences that went on and on and on… except when they needed to fart, of course, which was pretty often given the fact that they ate a diet composed mainly of a chili-cheese mixture embellished with corn chips and wrapped in flour tortillas, washing it down with a warm stale beer called Swillyesbutstilltasty.

Now, for all their social unacceptability and borderline sociopathy, they also possessed an innate kindness that forbade them to drown kittens or beat puppies, although the occasional flushing-of-goldfish was permitted as punishment of and object lesson to a disobedient child. This disavowal of violence and general amity and harmony with their neighbors, naturally, led to their rejection by the local Republican Party, forcing their representatives to minority positions in the area legislatures and virtually prohibiting the possibility that a member of their band ever be elected President. In fact, so apathetic was their population and so anti-establishment was their voting base that special laws had been enacted to summarily prohibit participation in the legislative process in any way unless and until they could prove that they subscribed to the State doctrine of Going-Along-To-Get-Along (refined from the previously-popular but highly politically incorrect Don't-Say-Shit-Even-If-You-Have-A-Mouthful).

Did I mention the name of this fascinating yet highly flawed group? Sorry, sometimes in my frenzied fervor to feed you festive fonts of alliterative details, I tend to forget the formalities and fail to identify my foragers. Let’s call them… Etruscans. Yes, I realize that there was a real civilization by that name, native inhabitants of ancient Etruria who influenced the Romans (who had, in recognition of this influence, suppressed them in typical Roman fashion until about 200 BC), but it’s the only one I can think of right now, so it’ll have to do.

There were lots of monsters living in the area immediately contiguous to the Etruscans, too. Ranging in size and intelligence from massive to miniscule, although the two indices were not in every case proportional, these beasts provided daily challenges to Etruscan existence.