Sunday, April 09, 2017

The Lord is on the Broadloom

Here he was at the age of 22.

Speaking of comedians, I had a relationship for over a decade with a man who was seriously funny. He could have been a professional comedian, I guess, except for his extreme manic-depression.

And he also appreciated when other people were funny so he told me an anecdote from a guy with whom he was once in a band, a guy named Russ.

As I remember, Russ was once an altar boy and participated in a Mass wherein a consecrated host (the "body of Christ" that Catholics consume in ritualistic cannibalism) was dropped during a Mass.

And according to Russ this was a major disaster in the chapel. I should mention that Russ, John (the comedian) and I are all atheists so we were unimpressed by the magic of ritualistic cannibalism and dropping "the host" - which by the way tastes like cardboard - is no big deal to us.

It was the way Russ described the horrified reaction of the faithful to this event that was so funny: "oh no the Lord is on the broadloom!"

I first heard this over twenty years ago but it still makes me laugh when I think about it. So I thought I would share it with the world - or the twenty or so potential people who will ever read this blog post.

Speaking of "the host" it's fun to watch French Canadian films like "Les Grande Chaleurs" because they frequently use "sacres" - the religious paraphanalia-based set of swear-words unique to the Quebecois. Luckily I heard about "sacres" prior to seeing Les Grande Chaleurs because if you only study the French language you won't normally be told  about the sacres: French people from France use the traditional swear word concepts (shit, bitch, etc.) So if you don't  know about sacres you will be very confused when the English subtitles for the French Canadian film say things like "tabernacle" and "host" and "chalice" (tabernak! osti! calice!) for no apparent reason.

Nowadays almost anything goes on television but when French in Action was made in Paris, in the 1980s, several people are portrayed in typical quotidian scenarios using words like shit (merde) and salope (bitch). But then again they are French. When I was growing up and going to the Jersey Shore you could always tell who the French Canadians were - they eschewed bathing trunks for men and instead went with banana hammocks. Osti!