Epitheton (e-pith’-e-ton): Attributing to a person or thing a quality or description-sometimes by the simple addition of a descriptive adjective; sometimes through a descriptive or metaphorical apposition. (Note: If the description is given in place of the name, instead of in addition to it, it becomes antonomasia or periphrasis.)
It was Pokey again. We were all ready to go and he hadn’t gotten to putting on his socks yet. Pokey was slow, but he was a master of stealth. He wore camo all the time, painting his face and wearing seasonally-themed camo fatigues with matching socks, hats, and underpants (just in case). My favorite was his “Summer Field” camo pattern. He looked like an innocent clump of Golden Rod.
Pokey was so slow you couldn’t tell he was moving. You’d look, and it was like he wasn’t moving, and while you were looking he would sort of disappear for a half-second and reappear an inch further along. It could take him a day to move five feet. He was like a sloth in a slow-motion video clip.
We all wracked our brains trying to figure out how his speedlessness might benefit us in some way. We thought about having Pokey race a turtle and charge admission. We tried it out, but it was too boring for words—the turtle would be headed into its pond before Pokey even got off the starting line. We tried him out as a shoplifter, thinking his stealthiness would work to his advantage. Everything just took too long. By the time he got to the door with a stolen item, the shop owner had time to call the police. When we heard the sirens coming, we picked up Pokey and gave him a getaway piggyback ride down the block to hide in an alley.
Luckily, Pokey spoke at a normal speed, so he could thank us. That’s when we got the idea that he could do scam phone calls. We set him up with a fake Amazon Customer Service site. People would call him who were having problems with Amazon. They would give their credit card info, Social Security numbers, bank routing codes, and passwords.
Pokey wore a headset with a microphone so he didn’t have to move—all of his calls were recorded, so they could be retrieved by other workers and put into play. We made millions in the first two weeks.
Then, our phones and computers were hacked by a gang from India called “The Kingfishers,” named after the beer brewed in Bangalore. INTERPOL had been looking for them for 20 years, starting when they scammed Nike into sending them 5,000 pairs of trainers on credit, and never paid. There was a $1million reward for the gang’s leader Harry Rhama, but INTERPOL had been unsuccessful in capturing him, or anybody in his gang for that matter,
We were impressed by the Kingfishers’ scammer acumen. We decided we wanted to partner with them. One of our gang members was from India. His name was Anya and his parents still lived there. He said he knew how to find the Kingfishers. So, we sent him to India as an envoy to find the Kingfishers and make some kind of a deal.
One week later we were raided by the FBI. I’m out of jail on $100,000 bail, awaiting trial for fraud, money laundering and 68 parking tickets.
Right after I got out on bail, I got an email from India. It read:
“I am so sorry. Harry Rhama paid me $2,000,000 to turn you guys in to the FBI. I hope you’re all well and looking forward to winning your trials.
Your friend,
Anya”
I emailed him back: “I regret to inform you, that your parents are going to die.” He sent me back their address and wired me $100,000 to “cover” my expenses. Anya was bad.
Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).
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