Monday, February 25, 2008

On Accidental Meaning & Numerology

Can nobody count? Lord, strike me blind!


Ninety-two plus Ninety-three makes 185 -- perhaps the number of stitches required to close all the wounds on the assistant coach who seated these two -- in chronological order -- on the West Virginnie bench. Get this straight. No. 92 should never, never, never, never, never sit to the left of No. 93. No. 93 could sit to the left of No. 92, but, I mean, that should probably never, never, never, never, never happen, either. What fool stitched the name "Dingle" onto No. 92 and "Berry" on No. 93 and didn't remark to himself -- ha ha, chuckle chuckle -- this would remind our enemies of the twist that one might develop in one's asshairs? Had he given them Nos. 90, say, and 96, this catastrophe could have, could have been averted. But still. Still. The two men (aka 92 & 93) must have considered the possibility of this event. Their teammates and sage coaches must have considered the possiblity. The news media, Lord, the news media. A cheerleader. A cautious fan. Somebody -- one person -- in all of West Virginnie must have seen this one coming. Surely, yes? Or do the Mountaineers require a Compound Noun Coach?

In addition to being the former half of dingle/berry, 92 is: The atomic number of Uranium; the total faces in The Snub Dodecahedron; a figure that runs through the films of Peter Greenaway. In addition to being the latter half of dingle/berry, 93 is: The atomic number of Neptunium; the code for international direct dial phone calls to Afghanistan; the title -- Quatre-vingt-treize -- of a Victor Hugo novel. You may recall 1992 with fondness but you do not, at all, personally, remember 1893. Safe to say that numbers divide us & numbers unite us. Consider, for a moment, the numbers 87 and 36. At first glance, they have nothing in common. The former is considered to be an unlucky number in Cricket, while the latter represents the number of inches in a yard, which is the primary unit of American football. In keeping with football, if No. 87, a Mr. Cody Nutter, on those same W.Va. Mountaineers, stood beside No. 36 on the Urbana Blue Knights, a Mr. Emmanuel Butters, well, then, you'd have Nutter/Butters, a compound noun and snack food upon which all people, Football and Cricket athletes, alike, can agree.


3 comments:

ITV said...

i propose the following lineup...perhaps for a special teams play....but imagine the following WVU players, lined up side by side:

#34, LB Robert MARY #74,OL Derek HAYES , #92 DL John DINGLE #93 DL Scooter BERRY and #12 WR Rouglas ODOR....

they have all the skills of a graffitoed bathroom stall and can compete for a national championship

mark wallace said...

185, and that's all I have to say.

DAN / DANIEL GUTSTEIN said...

if 92, 93, and 12 ever lined up sequentially, you'd have DINGLE BERRY ODOR. maybe on special teams? BA