risk-free questions! now! join the millions who...

"Try Smarmy absolutely risk-free."

"And now FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY you too can try Smarmy at no risk."

1. Risk, to whom? You? Or me?
2. What kind of risk? Medical? Financial? Moral?
3. What is "risk"?
4. Why should I believe your "risk-free" claim?
5. Doesn't everything have some risk potential, including reading THIS?
6. Isn't all time "limited"?
7. What is the limit of your time?
8. What is the limit of your space?
9. Is poetry risk-free?
10. Would you mind if I dehyphenate risk free?
11. If you concede risk is not "absolutely free," then what is its cost?
12. What is the best currency to use when paying for the cost of risk?
13. Do you get irritated and sore with me when I drivel on like this?
14. Do my interrogatives put you at the risk of losing your composure?
15. Are you one of the millions, or one of the few, the proud?
16. Am I the only one whose ears prick upward, like a dog's, at the sound of "risk-free"?
17. Are any of our politicians risk-free?
18. Is that what got us into this pickle, expecting our so-called leaders to guide through so-called risk-free times?
19. Who is doing the calling when something is "so-called"?
20. Who is doing the answering to these twenty questions?
    

naturally wondering

Wendy's is introducing "natural-cut fries with sea salt." That's from the package of a small order of fries, bought today, I am at liberty to say, in Liberty, New York, not far from Route 17.

NATURAL-CUT
FRIES
WITH SEA SALT

the package reads, also saying, "We slice up only whole Russet potatoes and leave the skin on to bring out their natural flavor." Also: "The result? Fries that are crispy, delicious, and totally irresistible." Hey! Maybe the serial comma is making a natural comeback! Love that serial comma after "delicious." Naturally. And meaningfully.

But here's the thing that has persnickety Pawlie scratching his grammarian's head: "natural-cut." It's that hyphenated adjectival construction that has me wondering.

• In nature, do Russet potatoes, or any potatoes, undergo cutting?
• How does natural cutting take place?
• Who does it? The Grim Reaper?
  
• What does it mean to be "naturally cut"?
• Does it hurt?
• Is it emo, even if naturally so?
• What is the opposite of "natural-cut fries"? "Artificial-cut fries"?
  
• How does one cut artificially? Through verbal ripostes?
  

Yass, yass, yass, as Jack Kerouac's Dean Moriarty would say, I think I know what Wendy's intends: natural taste, not processed, not doctored, not ruined by too much freezing, refreezing, microwaving, etc. Something like that. I get it. (Perhaps the copywriter could've called them "Natural, Cut Fries," but -- still -- what are "unnatural" fries? Picky. Picky. Picky. How about "Natural, Hand-Cut Fries"? Fine, but likely not literally true. Just thinking out loud, digitally, here.)

They're pretty good, the natural-cut fries from Wendy's. But I like Burger King's fries better; must be the peanut-oil taste. Arby's curly fries I like, too.

But hats off to Wendy's on its Apple Pecan Chicken Salad. Pretty good; reminds me of a Panera Bread salad.

Naturally.

And don't forget: the San Francisco Giants are still World Champs.

Still basking.

Doggone It!

Now that the Dog Days* of summer are ending (July 24-August 24, by some counts), and a reign of lassitude or howling frenzy is coming to a close, I offer the salubrious effects of my serial-comma-laden, I Leap for Kierkegaard-promoted, super-hyphenated blog.

* Caniculares dies, at whose start the Romans, it is said sacrificed a dog to appease the rage of Sirius, the Dog Star, brightest in the firmament except for the sun.

With the Dog Days behind us, we now don't have to take things so Siriusly, eh? (woof! OUCH!)

Septuple Hyphenated Hiatus of Hankering

On Friday morning, there were by my count 23 riders on the bus, a fivefold increase from the previous morning's commute. What do we owe the increased ridership to: Gas prices? Global warming? Payday? Report-to-caseworker day?

One of the new riders, a New Rider of the Purple Sage, was Marilyn Monroe, wearing a wise and lavender version of that fabulous famous dress that blows upward erotically from the sidewalk grate in a memorable scene from the 1955 film "The Seven Year Itch." (Speaking of which, I'm really itching to tell you that the movie's title yearns, cries out for, a hyphen between seven and year. And upon reflection, isn't the hyphen itself an intimate mark of punctuation, a subtle conjoiner, a conjugal connector? And upon even further reflection, is there really anything to that "seven-year itch" theory of wanderlust? Or is it more like "seven-minute itch"? The Laughorist wander-wonders, hyphenically.)

Speaking of wonder-wanderings, I almost plaintively asked Marilyn for a lurid lapdance, but demurred.

What do you think I am, some kind of purple necro-nut? Besides, it's a public bus, not a bus with the adjective preceding bus missing that fourth letter, a typo I have paranoically dreaded in my years as an editor.

Further besides, my libido flags at morningtime, at less than half-mast, the mourning dove of love all but dormant.