more from THE LAND OF THE CHEDDAR MONSTER VIVISECTIONISTS II:

My parents were still struggling with that part of speech known informally as dinner. Dad was in the garden with rodents, cooking rat's ass hamburgers. It was the first time he'd tried that. To me, eating hamburgers, any kind of hamburgers, is a brazen disregard for the rules of the Zoroastrianism, and polytheism in general. But, hey, a good burger's a good burger, and it's not like my parents are going to be making us traditional Zoroastrianistic foods any time soon.

So, while they munched nervously on their demonic burgers, my plan was to cut up Slappy for parts.

No other thought made me grin as broadly. Mom used to smile, talking about putting snail poison in Dad's salad. And Sara used to say that nothing felt better than burning bugs with a magnifying glass. And Jed. Jed used to remove entire spleens from wayward wolverines.

Another thing that made me grin was the word "dirigible". ¿What was up with *that? No other word made me squirm like that one. Not even "zoological".