The sergeant assured us we were able to monitor even the most littlest movements of the enemy with our hi-tech surveillance equipment day and night.
“The most littlest?” hissed one of the younger soldiers, a perpetual graduate student of Literature in civilian life. “Did he say the ‘most littlest?’”
“Yes, he did,” I said. “He probably tried to drive the point home and also sound folksy at the same time.”
Later the sergeant elaborated, it’s possible now to detect when the yellow-bellies upchuck their breakfast and scratch their balls. He added, predicting when and where the bastards are going to attack was easier than sticking wet noodle up a wild cat’s ass.
“Hahaha, that’s a good one,” chuckled a corporal, a tiresome joke meister himself. “You gotta give it to the sergeant, ‘sticking wet noodle up a wild cat’s ass’ is pure genius. Just imagine the picture, somebody’s trying to stick wet noodle up a wild cat’s ass. It’s like a metaphor! I love cats, too.”
As for me, it took a considerable amount of time to erase the other picture from my mind: the soldiers on the other side scratching their testicles and vomiting in tandem.
A week later when the artillery music was roaring deep staccato and the shells were exploding right next to our trembling asses, even the most ardent cat lovers began questioning the sergeant’s military acumen and, to an even greater extent, his English vocabulary.
The post English in the Trenches first appeared on Dissident Voice.
This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by J.S. O’Keefe.