This is a guest post by the esteemed Ian F. King, who totally manages to out-Bac-Log me! Seriously, how is it that I have never used "clod-hop"? Ian is just better at this game, much like the Emo-CD-naming game. I-Beam, I salute you, then curse your name behind your back.When word reached me that Grant was in desperate need of guest bloggers in order to insure the successful reaching of his fourth quarter profit estimates, I shared a knowing wink with Nugget, my trusty carrier pigeon and occasional backgammon opponent. "Surely that Mr. Laine will never change," Nugget said as he collected his standard fee of 10 seeds and flapped his way out the window, releasing his bowels on my azaleas below. I sighed heartily, for Grant, and for Nugget. No indeed, surely some things never do change.
Few of you may know this, but back when Grant started this blog in the late 1940's, I began my career working as Grant's assistant, and the world was a much different, and far more trying place back then. Hot pants weren't nearly as hot as they are today, one had to believe that it was butter because there was no alternative, and the perceived sensibility of the stovepipe hat appeared just that much larger in the rearview mirror of history. Oh Mr. Lincoln, what were you drinkin'?
It was in that decade's darkest hour that Grant first found himself in need of a guest blogger to continue posting his dietary habits while he went on what would be the first of several long retreats to the Galapagos islands, in order to commune with the giant sea turtles, one of which he believed at the time to be the reincarnated soul of Johann Georghehner, inventor of the hot dog. While I saw this opportunity as my first chance to really shine in the realm of letters, Grant quickly shot down the idea, attributing his denial of my dreams to lack of fortitude, though I suspected the truth to be that his decision was an admonishment of my questionable level of pulchritude. "Only the finest men alive today are fit to clod-hop the blogosphere in my magnanimous shoes," I remember him yelling at me from the bathroom.
Thus, it fell on my shoulders to lobby for the guest blogging services of the greatest, larger-than-life figures of that era, and I did so dutifully. The catch, of course, was that in order to solicit the services of these robust men, I had to pretend to be one of their kind as well, as no one of their stature would dream of reading a letter from simplefolk. I was crafty in my ways, and ingenious in my approach, and like the crafty and ingenious fox that fools the moronic and gaseous hound, I was able to convince everyone I wrote to send me a list of stuff they ate. They blogged like giants, they blogged like gentlemen, but most of all, they ignorantly accepted forged checks for their work, checks which somehow all managed to clear with the bank, thanks no doubt to the loose accounting practices of a one Mr. Howard Hughes.
Reminiscing about this forgotten moment in interweb history led me to take a stroll down memory lane in the direction of my filing cabinet, where for decades now I have kept copies of all my correspondence through and with Bac-Log. Among the letters I found, there was one that particularly struck a chord of nostalgia that rang like dinner bell throughout my ventricles. While I was unable to photocopy it, lest the too-fragile paper disintegrate upon its exposure to heat and light, I will dictate it here now for your enlightenment, in hopes that it will give you a greater understanding of Bac-Log, and the grandiose man behind it, the same man that Time Magazine called in its 1973 year-in-review issue, "the person who has shared more about the things that he has consumed in his life, through the medium of itemized lists, than any man, woman, or child now living or dead." It goes thusly:
February 12, 1945
Mr. Winston Churchill
10 Downing Street
London, UK
Winnie, my man,
Some conference yesterday, eh? Yalta? More like Yawn-ta! And what was the deal with Frankie's cape-jacket thingy? Perhaps this is some manner of Western hemisphere cloakery that hasn't quite made it into the ration warehouses of my vast and magnificent nation yet. I loved your hat, by the way, very "now." We really should get together like that more often, but next time, how about Cabo?
So while I'm crushing your attention in my cold iron fist, I thought I would humbly ask for a favor. One of my best friends, Grant V. Laine, is in dire need of the services of a guest blogger while he is temporarily away from his most noblest of posts. This would require no more effort of you than to draw up an itemized list of all of the things that you have eaten on any particular recent day, and send that list to the following address (Bac-Log!, Attn: I. King, 88 8th St, Hoboken, NJ) where it will then be transmitted into the homes of millions for their awe and delight. You would be granting an honorable favor to me, and to the world.
Anywho, I gotta run. My wife, she is like the great Siberian bear, and grows more beautiful and ravenous by the moment, so I must now attend to her.
Your Comrade and Pal,
Joseph Stalin
PS – Don't forget to include any desserts!
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