Branching out.

No I can't get the phone. Can't you see I've got my hands full? It's a shovel, you idiot - what do you think? I've been using it all morning. And I don't know the first thing about kneecap replacement surgery, so bugger off.

Oh, I'm sorry. Didn't know anyone was reading this blog at [INSERT CURRENT TIME HERE]. Just fending off requests from the various minions at large here in the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, where Big Green resides. It happens that I'm a bit indisposed at the moment, shoveling up another cubic yard of dirt to make way for the spreading tendrils of the man-sized tuber's many relatives. They've become something like permanent residents here over the past week. You know the drill - shirt-tail relative drops by for a couple of days, unpacks the suitcase, and next thing you know, you've got a lifer. That's right, friends - tubey's kin are putting down roots. (In this case, literally.) So naturally, those of us who have arms and legs are press-ganged into accommodating them. Just a slave, that's all. Crying shame.

Why do we agree to this indignity (and what may, to some, seem like the final indignity)? Well, remember - we invited all these groundlings over to cheer tubey up and out of the deep funk he'd fallen into, pining for the fields of his youth. It would hardly do to let the fellow down again, especially now, in front of all his fellow tubers. Yeah, it's inconvenient. Yeah, I'm getting sick of hauling fertilizer over from the local ag supply store (at great personal expense, I might add) and pressing it around the roots of some oddly misshapen mega-yam. Yeah, there's a limit - but we haven't reached it yet. At least I haven't. (The Lincolns reached theirs a long time ago. I think anti-Lincoln would sooner debate Hillary Clinton than raise another shovel of topsoil for tubey's relatives.) So on with the work assignment. One hand tied behind our back. No Lincolns. No Mitch. No Marvin (my personal robot assistant).

I know what you're thinking. Marvin's a machine, right? Why not program him to do the digging. Well, there are machines and then there are machines. Marvin's the latter. Not big on programming, generally. Also, he's being press-ganged by his inventor, Mitch Macaphee, to assist in one or two little experiments the esteemed scientist has taken on during his sojourn chez Big Green. What's he working on? Don't ask. No really, you don't want to know. Okay, okay, I'll tell you about one. It's a zombie thing. Yes, Mitch is a mad scientist, so this comes up once in a while. Turn your back for a day or two and he's resurrecting Frankenstein's monster. The thing with him is, he gets all the hard stuff right (giving it life, for instance) but skimps on the details. Like his latest zombie creation has been stumbling around for just a few days or so and it already needs a knee replacement. Couldn't he see that coming? (He borrowed the body parts from a carpet installer. I mean, even I could guess the knees would be history.)

So what the hell - how is a guy supposed to turn enough soil to keep the tuber family happy when he's got these half-baked zombies to deal with? Enough to drive you to the drink.