Category Archives: paromologia

Paromologia (par-o-mo-lo’-gi-a): Conceding an argument, either jestingly and contemptuously, or to prove a more important point. A synonym for concessio.

She: Your argument is as on-point as Boofy licking his butt. Isn’t that what you want? Boofy is a good dog. He hits the mark every time. He is earnest. He is accurate. He is just like you.

He: So you finally believe I’m dead. Now you know I died 3 weeks ago. You threw a plugged-in space heater into the bathtub when I was lounging there. I’m still there in the tub and I’m starting to smell.

She: Yes. Yes, but this is some kind of a joke, especially your smell. It has a lovely decaying flesh smell, just like you wanted. The bathroom is permeated with your stench, but the Fabreeze holds it down along with the pine scented candles I got for my birthday from my mother. Don’t be such a jerk. Maybe I killed you. So what? Remember? I caught you with the Blond Bombshell in the bushes in the park. You weren’t picking leaves—you were taking turns. It disgusted and angered me. So, here you are, dead in the tub.

He: Bravo! You make the case: my infidelity as a rationale for my murder. This is a really good reason—like all murder, it’s anchored in a “good reason.” It may not be legal, but it’s a good idea! Bravo! I’ll just keep floating here until you figure out how to dispose of me. Let me suggest: dismember me and burn me in the fireplace.

She: I don’t know. The smoke coming out of the chimney may smell putrid and I might be caught. I was thinking of bagging you up and dumping you piece by piece into the Delaware River from the Riegelsville Bridge. The catfish and crawfish and turtles will eat you up pretty fast.

He: ha. Ha. I’ll go along with you either way because I’m dead. I couldn’t change your mind, even if I wanted to. Being dead puts me at an insurmountable disadvantage. Just call me Johnny Rotten. Ha. Ha. Get it? My smell. Ha. Ha.

She: Ha. Ha. It looks like we have a plan Mr. Rotten. I’m headed to the hardware store to buy a chainsaw.

POSTSCRIPT

She had gone mad, conversing with her murdered boyfriend. Her friends started noticing her peculiar behavior, like insisting they leave an empty seat next to her when they went out. She would talk to the empty seat, yelling about Blond Bombshell, infidelity, and murder. If she ate a hamburger, she would dip her fingers in the side-order of ketchup and hold up her hands and cackle. She was clearly out of it. Accordingly, her friends brought her to “Shiny Mind Asylum.” She kept complaining about the smell.

Eventually, her boyfriend’s cut-up bones were found downriver from the Riegelsville Bridge—scattered on the river bottom. The police put his bones in a basket and brought them home to his parents. His parents mentioned that he had a girlfriend who was in a mental institution. The police questioned her and she made fun of every question they asked her—telling her fantasy boyfriend not to laugh or he’d be in “big trouble.”

The police were entertained by her behavior and left the asylum laughing. They were through with her, and she was through with herself. She escaped from Shiny Mind Sanatorium, jumped off of Riegelsville Bridge, and drowned.

They found a headless shirt and pants effigy stuffed with hay in her room. Everybody laughed and they burned the effigy in the sanatorium’s incinerator.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

Daily Trope is available in an early edition on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

Paromologia (par-o-mo-lo’-gi-a): Conceding an argument, either jestingly and contemptuously, or to prove a more important point. A synonym for concessio.

I told her I couldn’t take the dog for a walk because it was dark and I might get lost. She told me we’ve been living here for 12 years and it hadn’t happened, so it was nearly certain it wouldn’t happen now. Damn, I lost again. But, I’d give it another try. “But this could be the time.” She told me to shut up and handed me the dog leash. “But, what do think, I’m a flashlight.” She told me to shut up again and put the leash in my hand.

Losing to my wife had been going on for years, but I always had a new reason not to walk the dog up my sleeve, or ready to pull out of my ass. I didn’t hate the dog, but I hated walking him—walking, stopping, sniffing, peeing, and eventually squatting and dropping a steaming bomb. And then, I had to squat and pick it up in a little plastic bag. If anybody had told me 30 or 40 years ago that we’d be picking up our dog’s shit by the side of the sidewalk, I would’ve thought they were some kind of creepy poopoophiliac, on medication, and undergoing counseling for their condition. Anyway, I hated walking down the street with a bag of swinging hot poop in my hand. So, I had invented the “Poopvac.” It was like a Dust Buster for dog poop. It was a hollow walking stick with a rechargeable battery-powered a vacuum concealed in the handle. You inserted a specially designed condom-like receptacle in the walking stick’s tip. You’d hold it over a poop, pull the trigger, and it would suck up the poop and seal the receptacle in one smooth move. It was a failure. The receptacles had a tendency to explode, spewing poop from the walking stick’s handle. I tried to get funding to perfect it on “Go Fund Me.” I raised $16 and was mercilessly ridiculed. I gave up. A dark time in my life.

Two nights ago, I told my wife I couldn’t walk the dog because my foot hurt. I figured that was a winner, because she’d have a hard time proving it was a lie. She got up and went into the bathroom. I heard the medicine cabinet squeak open. She cam back with a bottle of Ibuprofen, told me to take two and shut up. I was had again. Would I ever come up with a reason not to walk the dog that would work—that would persuade her?

Last night was the end of it all. I told my wife I couldn’t walk the dog because I couldn’t find him. Somehow, he’d gotten lost. But actually, I had hidden him under the bed with a bag of Doggy Doodles dog treats. I was just starting to realize that putting him under the bed was a bad idea—he was housebroken, but not that broken. Just then, my wife walked past the bed and the dog came slithering out and ran in circles around her. She took him for a walk.

When she got back, she told me she was sick of the nightly dog walking bullshit, that she would walk the dog from now on. My new responsibility is “Housekeeper.” I keep the place clean, do the laundry and cook our meals. My wife walks the dog and pays the bills. Currently, I’m watching Julia Child reruns and working on a chicken fist puppet “Punch and Judy” routine.

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

Paromologia (par-o-mo-lo’-gi-a): Conceding an argument, either jestingly and contemptuously, or to prove a more important point. A synonym for concessio.

All right, you’re right smart ass. You made me contradict myself again. You claim it is either day or not day, I realized after I asked “What about the Twilight Zone?” that I was wrong. I thought that was an example of something between day and not day manifest by an expanded view of time—sort of an other-worldly time ticking out an expanded understanding hours, minutes, and seconds. Rod Serling would say at the start of each episode The Twilight. tZone:

“You’re traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That’s the signpost up ahead – your next stop, the Twilight Zone! Narrator : You unlock this door with the key of imagination.”

There is something about truth that isn’t liberating—it does not set you free, rather it enslaves you to its pronouncements. This is another stupid idea of mine, maybe at the top of the list. So much insanity is premised by “It’s true that. . .” Anybody who tries to refute the ”truth” Is bad, sometimes worthy of execution. But we know the actual truth is bereft of feeling, unless it is tangled up with sincerity— with being truthful. And so, we come to belief. It is a choice to do something with truth that makes it true. Then, there is faith—maybe just a willingness to act on something because it is grounded in, or consistent with, a social institution’s keynote as a voice in the wilderness.

I could write a pretty bad book about all this. I really don’t know what I’m talking about. But, when I was twelve, I was chasing fireflies in the field behind my house. The field grass was tall, and Dad had mowed several trails. There was a fire pit where I sat down after I got bored with the fireflies. Suddenly a man in a red suit emerged from the grass. He pointed at me and I rose around three feet off the ground. He turned and started walking and I followed him three feet off the ground. A patch of woods off the field had been cleared and a Suburban Propane delivery truck was sitting there.A staircase descended from the side of the truck’s storage tank. Floated up the stairs and landed on my feet as the door closed. The interior of the rank was huge. There were rows of seats like an airliner. The man told me not worry—that no harm would come to me. There was a little test he would give to me. He started asking questions. First: How many fingers do you have? I said 10. He said “Wrong: You have 8 fingers and 2 thumbs.” It went on like this for 15-20 minutes. Then, he said “Thank you for your cooperation and the door opened, and I floated out. I woke up at the fire pit to the roar of the propane truck taking off.

I told my mother what happened and she told me to shut up, or I’d end up with Aunt Lucy at the State Hospital. I said, “But Ma, it is true. It really happened.” She picked up the phone and I recanted.

I am 43 now. I have noticed there is a man in a red suit that hangs out across the street from my apartment. The other day he pointed at me and started laughing.

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu)

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.