1017 – The Balloon Monarch

Episode 1017 – The Balloon Monarch

 

[START OF RECORDING]

 

SCOOTER:    Alright everybody, this is Scoots here.  This is another famous tale that I heard one time and that, believe it or not, the people…well, the beings that told me this were two pigeons.  Once upon a time, I was feeling a little bit like taking a walk.  I took a walk and I was sitting on a bench across the street from a…one of those stores…I think it was still a Kmart.  It may have still been a Kmart back when this happened.  I was sitting there across the parking lot looking at the Kmart.  Not at the doors of the Kmart or the windows; I was studying one of…the carousel that sat outside of Kmart.  It was a carousel that could fit four children.  I never thought about this before.  What is the rules?

 

Because only one person pays, and if you don’t have four children…I guess it’s an opportune…talk about an opportunity for small gestures of kindness and community that we probably missed out on.  Maybe not though, where you say hey, does…any other children around want to ride this carousel?  I’m about to put a quarter in so the child I’m with can ride.  But it was a mini-carousel, four seats.  I don’t even know…I mean, technically you had to call it a carousel.  But what I was struck by was that this one was out of order.  So, I was just kinda staring at it and I wasn’t thinking of those things.  I was thinking that the top of it looked a bit like a crown, and I didn’t know if that was intentional or not.  On this crown on top of a carousel were two pigeons.  They were just kinda sitting there.  It looked like they were just chilling.

 

It kinda looked like they were having a conversation, so I decided to get a little closer and sit…there was a bench right there, I guess a bench where if you had your child on a carousel…the carousel, you could sit and enjoy them enjoying the carousel.  So, I got there and I sat down, and the pigeons, they looked at me but I didn’t have any popcorn or any…I didn’t have anything, so then they went back to their conversation.  I guess they didn’t realize I was listening in, but they were talking pretty loud.  I happened to just…they were talking, and what should have been…should be the most important part of this story, but at the time, I was more enthralled in the story they were telling.  I mean, that could have been on the front page of the paper.  Probably…I think I tried to call that in.

 

You know, breaking news; local boy talks to pigeons in front of Kmart…broken-down carousel…and they said wait a second, the carousel at Kmart’s broken down?  How…what am I gonna do with all my quarters I’ve been…?  I guess there’s the horsey.  They’d say oh, no, it was the…and I say no; first of all, you got the…was that a click-baity headline?  Because I didn’t say I was talking to the pigeons when I called in the hot tip number.  Two pigeons were talking, telling a…talking to one another.  I didn’t talk to them.  I was just listening.  Yeah, the carousel was out of order, but that really wasn’t the point.  I was…the point was that they were speaking in English, so that’s why…but so, that could have happened but instead, I just listened to this tale.  The pigeon was telling the tale of the balloon monarch.

 

Sometimes pigeons talk very fast, so I wasn’t exact…said…’cause I was listening in; I couldn’t say did you…is the title of the story The Balloon Monarch or The Monarch That Loved Balloons or The Monarch That Was a Balloon?  So, for a little while, I wasn’t really listening because I was imagining a monarch…the monarch ball…like, I said wait a second, oh, are you talking about a monarch…a butterfly that’s a balloon?  But then I was imagining some sort of king and queen that were actual balloons floating around and stuff.  But so, I…here’s what I know; once upon a time, some stuff happened, and then there was a farmhouse.  The farmhouse was pink and it had a thatched roof, a stone fireplace, it was made from pink…like, deep pink; not hot pink…like neon pink…no, I guess hot pink, I think.

 

I think it was hot pink, I think…wood beams.  Then a lighter bubble…cotton-candy pink stucco.  Once upon a time, there was a couple that lived in the house, and they decided to go on a picnic.  They packed a picnic basket, or one of them packed it, because they…it was their idea.  They said, would you like to go on a picnic?  I’ve planned one for us.  The other person…the person said well, it’s a little warm.  I’m not sure.  How far away?  They said oh, it’s gonna be a special picnic.  I have a jug of our finest lemonade and a baguette and cheeses.  I have plenty…I have dessert even, so it’s gonna be so great.  So, let’s go.  The person…so, they had a picnic basket.  The person, also, they wore a stocking cap during the day.

 

I don’t know why the…I said, why…pigeons, they get interested in some…and the other pigeons said, a stock…like, one from a bedtime story?  I said yeah, like a sleeping cap.  Like, one that has…that’s too long for the head and it goes down with…and it ends in a poof ball.  The other…the pigeon telling the story said, exactly like that.  They said interesting, interesting, interesting.  So, they said okay, well, anyway, can you get back to the story?  Are you sure?  Yeah, I just wanted to point that out.  It said well, why is it important?  It said well, it’s important, one, ‘cause it tells you a lot about one of these people.  They’re probably pretty cool or they could be pretty annoying.  It’s hard to tell right now.  But so, also, it’s a part of the story, yeah.  But I thought it’d help you relate or not relate to the character.

 

So, they just lived in a farmhouse, right?  They were farmers.  This particular farmer, this…Old Stocking Cap we’ll call that person, and the guest, they were out.  They said…Stocking Cap…there was stuff going on.  You don’t just…not many people just go on a picnic.  Oh, you should know this about pigeon storytelling, is that most pigeons, they do their…because they’re observing humans all day long, they’re entertain…they find humans endlessly entertaining and fascinating.  Maybe not in the most complimentary way.  So yeah, they do tell stories about humans to entertain one another, just ‘cause the other pigeons, they’re too competitive.  Pigeons are very competitive, so they can’t listen…you would…this is not the kind of thing they teach in school; pigeons can’t suspend their disbelief about pigeon-based stories.

 

This is true for most competitive birds.  You say Scoots, give me a list of the most competitive birds.  I say, I can’t do that.  I’m in the middle of a story.  I can only go on this tangent about pigeons being competitive.  This was a famous study conducted within my imagination at the Institute of Pigeon Studies.  Or maybe it was the Institute for Pigeon…Fictional Pigeons or Pigeon Fiction.  But…or maybe it was a competition about how many times you could accidentally say ‘pigeons’.  But they’re just very competitive, so if you start telling them a story about pigeons with pigeons in it, they place…it’s hard for them to listen, just kinda like it’s confusing for me watching the latest three Star Wars movies, especially the first two, because…well, a couple different reasons.  Now I forget the character’s name, of course.

 

[00:10:00] But he was BB-8’s best friend and he’s a rogue, and very good…the best pilot in the galaxy.  Not Finn.  I can’t remember the character’s name.  Something like Smooth Pilot or something.  I’ll think of it.  Oh, I almost had it, but then Finn’s name popped in my head.  Now, Finn, I kind of…is a little bit more approachable, in my opinion.  But this character I get jealous of.  I say wait a second, this…I mean, Finn and BB-8 are friends, very close friends.  I can say okay, I can deal with that.  But this…the other character…oh, his name starts with…Poe.  Poe Dameron.  I find myself competing with Poe Dameron in my…you know, I say well, I can’t suspend my disbelief because I have strong feelings about him based in a vulnerable part of me where I say wait a second, how come Poe Dameron gets to hang out with BB-8?

 

I want BB-8 to run up to me like…and hug me.  Not hug me, but be ‘I can’t believe you’re here’ kinda thing.  I want to be the one to say all that stuff and do the…do a barrel roll.  So, that’s how it is for pigeons, too; they just say, you lost me.  When the story had another pigeon in it…for example, one of the famous books is Don’t Let the…Don’t Let A…is it Don’t Let A Pigeon Drive the Bus or Don’t Give A Pigeon Too Many Cookies?  Either way, if you sit down with a group of pigeons and try to tell them that story, you might not notice it unless you’re…you have a pigeon sensitivity.  But they’re gonna start acting out because…they’re gonna stop listening.  They’re gonna say drive…those in Australia will recognize this kind of as the tall poppies.  It’s very similar with pigeons.

 

It’s different because…they’re just naturally competitive, but this is just…when storytelling, they just can’t…they actually learn to adapt, which you’d say wow, glad pigeons are so competitive.  But they still want to consume fiction, narrative fiction.  They just don’t want to consume narrative…pigeon-based narrative fiction.  Only cost 1.4 billion imaginary doll hairs to get that study completed and find that out.  Then they sent me an abstract.  I said, what is this?  I want it in…I want to be able to understand it.  Even the part of my brain said oh, goodness.  So, where were we?  Oh, so these pigeons are telling each other a story, and they’re fixated on the stocking cap of one of the characters in the story, a human who the pigeon was calling Stocking Cap.

 

So, the humans, they went out, and Stocking Cap had scouted out to try to find the perfect place to have a really nice picnic.  So, Stocking Cap had found this one place.  It was a clearing, it had a beautiful view of the countryside, it was like…but you had to go through the woods to get there.  Not bad.  But they went through the woods, they went up to this picnic site, and they were relaxing there.  They were enjoying the picnic.  They were in love.  I think that was part of it, was…I don’t know.  It’s just part of something Stocking Cap wanted to do for the other character who wore their hair in a…not a bun.  What do you call it when the buns are on the side of your head?  But this…that’s how this character wore their hair.  I don’t know what that’s called.

 

I always think of Princess Leia which is weird because that’s not intentional that I was just talking about Poe Dameron.  But anyway, this character wore their hair in a bun on the side of their head.  So, they were there, they were enjoying the picnic.  They were kissing occasionally.  They had their shoes off and they were…you know, they do that thing where you kick back on your elbows and look at the sky and you sigh.  You laugh and you nap, all that stuff.  They were just enjoying their-selves, and then they kinda got bored and they were looking at the clouds.  Old Stocking Cap took off their stocking cap and…’cause they probably got warm, you’d think, but they said what do you think that cloud looks like, my dear?  Old Bun Hair; that’s what I’ll call the other character.  This is what the pigeon said.

 

You’d say Scoots, this is…and I say well, we’re…this is a layer of the story.  I’m only trying to translate what the pigeons were talking about and what I was able to surmise.  Also, every once in a while, somebody would come out and they’d get…they’d say, what are you doing?  Waiting for them to fix…you know how many people think that’s a funny joke, that shopping…?  Could be shopping at anywhere, but just…this happened to be Kmart shoppers.  They would come out of Kmart, they would sit down…this was all…of all the diversity of Kmart’s customers, almost all of them except for little kids…when I say little, I mean like two or three.  But even kids older than that to very older adults, and cross-cultural…about every forty minutes someone would sit down next to me and they’d say, what are you doing?

 

Waiting for them to fix the carousel?  In their own voice or their own intonation and with their own punchline.  What are you doing?  Waiting for them to fix the carousel?  What are you doing, waiting for them to…?  Hardy…and I’d say hardy-har-har.  But I wasn’t really…it didn’t really bother me ‘cause I was listening in on the pigeons.  But it was also distracting, so some…I’d say…’cause occasionally someone would sit and they’d say what time’s the bus come, or something?  I’d say hardy-har-har.  Then they’d say, my word.  Then they’d walk off.  So, anyway.  So, I’m listening to the pigeons; they’re telling the story, a summary.  A couple went on a pic…a couple went for a picnic.  You think that’s…they lived in a pink farmhouse, and that’s all that’s happened so far.  Perfect picnic spot up on a hill, through the woods.

 

Beautiful view of the countryside.  They got to the point where they’d…they were looking for some entertainment because…or, I don’t know.  Something, because the picnic part had petered out and they’d already napped and kissed.  This is a open, hilly picnic spot, so not much other than light kissing.  But so, the…Old Stocking Cap said hey, look up at the sky and tell me what you see in the clouds.  Bun Hair would say oh, that looks like a puppy dog.  Then they’d say okay, tell me more about the puppy dog.  Does it have…is it one of those dogs with long legs or short legs?  Kinda go…they’d go through like that.  So, this is the first time it happened ‘cause there’s only one time where it had the…like, it had a smaller element of surprise after the first time.

 

Bun Hair did hear something, but Stocking Cap said keep an eye on that cloud; tell me what you see.  But eventually Bun Hair…after describing this first dog that Bun Hair saw in the clouds looked over.  Within the stocking cap, Stocking Cap was making a animal balloon.  Or, is that what you call them?  A balloon animal.  Animal balloon; balloon animal…and then would give it to them.  Then they did this four or five times.  It got pretty competitive ‘cause they were in a relationship, so they were having fun.  Bun Hair would say that looks like a shlo-flon-fleet-oranon.  Stocking Cap said did you say a shlo-shlon-fleeter-lonnon or a fleet…shlo-shlon-flooter-flowden?  Then they would laugh and then say okay, well, it has feathers.  Now, a little thing about balloon animals; you do ask leading questions.

 

I’ve studied enough balloon animal artists…and then this situation to where they ask oh, did it have a long, thin [00:20:00] tail or a long, thin nose?  You see, there’s really…and you could say, neither.  You say oh, okay.  Did it have a little round little nose or a little round little tail?  So, that way you…and probably you ask other questions based on…I don’t know how they choose the balloons or anything.  But anyway, they went back and forth like that and kept making balloon animals ‘til they were surrounded with five or six balloon animals.  Then they were delighted.  Then they were…I mean, they were…talk about staying power.  I mean, then they were playing with the balloon animals like…that they were toys.  This is when they were fully enthralled.  You could see why pigeons would like this story.

 

This was another time I stopped paying attention, but I think there was even a story within the story about what they were playing, like with the fleeter-flodding-frooter-lowden and whatever, the dog and that they were…oh, do you want…?  This is how…this is…oh, do you want to come out and play?  Sure, I’d love to come play.  Oh, what do you want to play?  Let’s play Dancing Dance.  Oh, okay.  Let’s play Dancing Dance.  Oh, can we play Twirly Time now?  So, something like that because again, someone really goofed on me that time.  They said huh, just sitting here, eh?  I say, just sitting here trying not to talk to anybody that tries to talk to me while I’m sitting here, in my head.  They said oh, not a talker, are you?  I said well, what do you gotta point that out for?  Again, in my head.  They said well, I’m one to point it out.  Yes, sir.

 

I say holy cow, is this a version of bench-splaining?  Are you bench-splaining me?  Then…but they took me on such a long ride, and then they still came back at the end with…waiting for…what are you waiting for?  They tricked me into answering.  I said, nothing.  They said oh, did you give up on the carousel getting repaired?  I don’t know, something like that.  It was a better of a burn.  I said, I just…like, I said what, are you eighty-six years old and you just tricked…you just gave me a seven-minute build-up to a carousel-repair punchline.  Okay, so the couple’s having the picnic; they’re playing with these balloon animals.  Oh boy, how wonderful could it possibly get?  Even more wonderful, I’ll tell you.  It could have got more wonderful ‘cause Old…they had made a deal.

 

Old Stocking Cap said to Bun Hair hey, why don’t you get dinner ready?  Just trust me.  Then dinner will be ready and we can do the dishes first so that…talk about nice.  Isn’t that one of the best things you never think to do?  Like, when you go out for something, then you say, I gotta make dinner?  Ugh.  Or even if you’re…say well, I’ll just figure…you know, they couldn’t just order dinner out.  They lived in the countryside.  So, they had dinner prepared, waiting at home for them, so it could have got better, because then they could go home.  Let’s see, I’m trying to put…make this for everybody, but…in any order, they could go home, they could…if this picnic rekindled or kindled any romance-type stuff…you know what I’m saying.  ‘Cause they said well, now we’re in the privacy of our own farmhouse.

 

Let’s have our dinner and eat it too, or whatever.  You know.  Then there’s…they had dessert.  So, it was really well thought-out.  I think the pigeons admired that in the human.  If it was a pigeon-based story, they’d…they would have found a hole in it or something, or they would have said…I don’t know.  But in this sense, even…I think hopefully all of us are enjoying it just like the pigeons were; saying wow, this is really going good, eh?  There was even…I think this was…I’m not sure what stage this was.  It could have been a early relationship or it could have been a long-term relationship of discovery, because at one point Bun Hair said I didn’t even know you were a balloon sculptor.  Then they said well, there’s many more things I’d like to know.  So, it was like that kinda thing, too.

 

But so, there they were, of course, sculpt…playing with sculpted balloons or formed balloons or twisted balloons; however you want to say it, when who could come across the clearing but…you know, I don’t know what these kind of hats are called.  They’re hats made of leaves, but they’re not…they don’t look like leaves.  You see them on…I don’t know.  I’d say, what is that called?  I don’t know.  Not a rattan hat, but maybe it was a rattan hat.  I don’t think they have those.  But it was this person in some sort of hat made of some sort of leaf-like material.  But it didn’t look like it was made of leaves; it looked like it was a woven hat or…you know what I’m saying.  I just can’t think of the word.  You know, a fancy hat, but a hat that conveyed authority that probably cost money or time to create.

 

They came across the field slowly.  The couple didn’t really notice them at first, but then the person was wearing a cloak and out of their cloak dashed a cat, and the cat kinda jumped on one of the balloons that had blown off the picnic blanket, and it popped.  Then, of course broke the mood, and then the cat popped the other ones.  Then they said what is…your cat; it’s popping our balloons.  They said, it’s probably not good for it.  This person in the cap said, you’re trespassing.  They said,  trespassing where?  They said, trespassing on the land of Your Graces.  They said, Your Graces?  That’s beyond the next set of hills; the castle.  They said, this is their Leisure Lands.  You’re trespassing on their Leisure Lands where they come for leisure.  They’ll be coming today, or this evening, for leisure.

 

You’ve ruined their leisure by being here.  They went back and forth.  The pigeons, they had an opinion about this; they said what…who do these Graces think they are?  The person said well, I work for them, you know.  I’m the authority figure.  They said well, I guess we’ll go home then, but it wasn’t very nice of your cat to pop our balloons.  Then the authority figure said, balloons, balloons.  What is a balloon?  They looked at each other, but balloons weren’t really common knowledge back then because you had to make them.  Well, you don’t want to know how they did it back in the days where there was castles.  Just trust me; they’re balloons.  So, they weren’t really well-known ‘cause you had…mostly you’d find balloons on farms or with people with a lot…you know, I should have just kept moving on.

 

So, they’re just made from natural stuff.  I mean, I don’t know why I’m…this is a gift from nature and never used…never wasteful.  There you go.  So, they said okay, well, anyway, we gotta get going here because…and they said, you’re going nowhere.  They said yeah, we’re going home.  We actually have dinner prepped.  We had a lovely day.  I’m sure you did, I’m sure you had a day of leisure on the Leisure Lands, but that’s outlawed.  This isn’t your land to leisure on, and the Graces are a particularly foul mood this year, and last…this decade.  When they learn of this, they’re gonna expect to be reccomsaid…you know, whatever.  You know, the…for their loss of leisure.  Then they said…Bun Hair said there’s…leisure’s not a zero-sum thing.  They said, there’s enough leisure to go around.

 

Then the authority figure said well, one of yous gonna have to prove that fact to the monarchs.  This is the kind of tale…you know what happens in these tales.  It’s a bedtime story, but things went too far.  They said well, one of yous gonna have to entertain…put the Graces in a good mood, and one of you isn’t.  It kinda got…[00:30:00] this authority figure was really harshing their mellow.  So, they were…they had strong feelings about it.  So, Bun Hair, of course, she brought out the C-U-R-S-E, both in her language but also she said we’re no mere farmers; we’re amateur entertainers and I’m a magic-user.  By the power of these balloons, I make sure that Your Graces never enjoy anything ever again balloon-related.  But for…’til the…and then the authority figure said well, I’m also a magic-user and I work for the Graces, keeping their Leisure Lands and their non-Leisure Lands in order.

 

I’m authorized to tell…to enforce those rules…what serves Their Graces to the best of my abilities.  This was the conflict the pigeons really enjoyed, and they were acting it out and stuff.  But eventually the authority figure said okay, well, you already got your curse in, but by the way, the rest of this is just gonna…I got…we got our…everybody that works for the Graces around here; I just have to blow my whistle or raise my voice and they’ll come running.  So, why don’t you come along?  Then they said okay, basically, here’s what I’ve decided, is that you with the bun hair, you’re gonna have to live up in the great tower here in the deepest of the woods, where…the heart of the Leisure Land, and overlook the Leisure Land.

 

Now, holy moly, is…was this…heart of the woods; you’d figure okay, not a lot of natural light, kinda gloomy.  No, no, no.  But if someone said I’m gonna take you to the Leisure Lands, you might say eh.  But if you saw a picture of it, you’d say holy moly, it was like a palatial estate.  But it also had this giant tower.  Now, the giant tower mostly served as a beacon and a lookout and whatever, so they said you’re gonna be up in the tower and you’ll be able to look down at all the leisure going on and see in all directions.  If anything comes, you’re supposed to let us know.  If anything comes and you let us know, we’ll let you out of leisure…you’ll be able to de-leisure.  Otherwise you’re gonna have to stay up there until you manage to…your partner here, Old Stocking Cap, manages to undo…to find a way to break whatever you did and find a way to make them enjoy balloons.

 

They said oh boy, have you got us.  So, they went in and they sent Bun Hair all the way up to the top of the tower.  Bun Hair actually said well, I hope we get invaded, and then I can tell you about the invasion and we…I get out, and then the invasion still happens.  We think about that every day.  Now, Old Stocking Cap got assigned to the throne room which overlooked the pool, and there’s natural spring pools and a lot of cool stuff.  The Graces were there.  They were younger monarchs.  They found that they…another part of the curse that didn’t really get attention because I wasn’t paying attention, ‘cause again…at one point I went in and got a gumball from the machine because I just thought I could use a couple gumballs.

 

But I think another part of the curse was that they were also kind of…everyone…or maybe they didn’t know this, but they were kinda also caught up in this thing until…what they didn’t know…I guess everybody but Bun Hair and Stocking Cap…it was kinda like this groundhog situation where they couldn’t enjoy balloons but they couldn’t leave the Leisure Lands until they…until the curse was broken.  How do you break a curse?  The only way to break it is presumably…it was you either have someone come and…so, anyway, that’s…kinda explains why they didn’t just go back to their castle right away.  Maybe they weren’t gone that long, because Old Stocking Cap started to make balloons…balloon animals.  There was also hired storytellers, so they would do the balloons, but nothing did it.  The Graces were just like eh, boring.

 

But Old…here’s the thing; Old Stocking Cap was very, very smart, and these weren’t like…these balloons, they were very high quality.  Old Stocking Cap would even say what if one day you do enjoy these balloons?  Let’s dip them in paraffin or paraffin so that you have them as toys, and we’ll pile them up somewhere for someday.  Old Stocking Cap just said I’m here, man.  I’m making balloons.  The first few years, it was just balloon animals, and at some point Stocking Cap said well, I can’t keep this up, even though there became thousands of balloon animals stacked at the extra toy yard which just happened to be next to the giant tower, of course.  You see where this is going.  So, there was…that was the original plan, was like oh, I can stack up all these balloon animals in the middle of the night.

 

I’ll run up, rescue my sweet, sweet Bun Hair, and we’ll get outta there.  But eventually, you know, you can’t…you can only make so many balloon animals in a year before…one, it gets repetitive, and two, you kinda get…you say okay, this is exhausting.  So, this was the moment in history that doesn’t get an…I mean, this I guess was a thing; the pigeons, because I think they were…maybe they saw people coming in outta the…I don’t know; did Kmart have balloons?  Fay’s was down the way.  Maybe Fay’s had balloons.  But they were familiar with them ‘cause they’re birds flying around.  They don’t live 100% of the time on the top of a broken-down carousel.  But this was the time when they invented balloons as we know them, because they had this whole entourage to keep these two…what do you call them?

 

Monarchs entertained.  So, I guess…what’s his name?  Stocking Cap was really a collaborator, so he’d say okay, let’s paint some things.  So, they started painting balloons.  At first it was silly faces, and then it was things from stories and stuff like that, but you couldn’t really make those out of paraffin and put them…and pile them up.  So…and the kids…the monarchs, they never got into it because it was…one, they had…if you know you’re gonna have another balloon tomorrow…but two, also the curse.  They couldn’t get over the curse, you know.  So, Old Stocking Cap said okay, I don’t know, I don’t know.  Stocking Cap did figure out one thing; eventually some of the travelers or teachers, they said well, there’s balloons in other things and there’s these floating balloons.  You put a candle and the balloon will float.

 

So, they went through a period of floating balloons.  Now, this gave Stocking Cap an idea of how to communicate, finally, two-way with Bun Hair.  ‘Cause for the time, Bun Hair would drop notes down for Stocking Cap, and Stocking Cap would communicate with gestures and stuff.  But it was really unsatisfactory.  Bun Hair was writing these deep letters and also saying we gotta get outta here.  They just send me up a bucket of oats and a bucket of carrots and two buckets of water every day, and it’s not fun.  Also, I’m a little bit irritated with these monarchs and their balloons.  So, once Stocking Cap and Bun Hair could communicate, they started to say okay, well, how is everybody else feeling?  They say, no one likes these monarchs.  They said okay, let’s figure out a way to [00:40:00] deal with it.

 

We’re already on a…we’re on a long game, breaking a curse.  We kinda trapped ourselves in and got re-cursed.  They said, where’s the authority figure?  They said, the authority figure’s waiting ‘cause they don’t realize that we’re stuck in this day over and over and over again.  They said okay, so they figured out that they could get everybody else…they got the storytellers and the musicians to start really telling these more action-oriented stories about conflict within lands and that monarchs aren’t always monarchs, and sometimes there’s forest beings or other rulers, all that kind of stuff.  Some history…even history, actual history.  Meanwhile, what do you call it?

 

Stocking Cap was working on grander and grander balloon designs, and ones that…with a plan, because not only was Bun Hair supposed to be looking out, but there was other levels on the tower, right, where there was guards and stuff keeping an eye on stuff.  So, what eventually they realized was if you did it at night with a candle balloon on a string with a painting on it, you could kinda bring it up in front of one of the lookouts and show them a scene that they would think is happening in the distance.  They were able to perfect this by testing it out with Bun Hair because at first it was like, Bun Hair’s like no, no, no, I can see the sides of the balloons; change the color.  Or oh, this only works on nights with full…not on a full-moon night, so three-quarters or less.

 

So, they started to get this idea that yeah, there’s forces amassing outside of the woods, and they started to get warnings.  They were like okay, they’re getting…they’re slowly moving in.  The monarchs started to get worried.  They said well, what are we gonna do?  What are we gonna do?  What’s his…Stocking Cap said okay, why…what if I could do something?  They said, what would you do?  The authority figure was there ‘cause the authority figure was also concerned, ‘cause the authority figure really had no way…’cause again, there was this fog of delusion down there a little bit, too.  Stocking Cap laid everything out and said okay, so, we’re under a dual-curse situation.  My beloved Bun Hair’s up in the tower and they’re not gonna be able to come down until we’re…we’ve freed you from the curse of never being able to enjoy balloons.

 

But we also know that there’s this amassing force out there that your troops see every single night.  Stocking Cap said what if my dearest Bun Hair is a powerful magic-user?  What if we can deal with these troops and the fires and the movement out on the edges of your Leisure Land?  If they all go away, will you free us?  They said we will, but we…we come…and I said no matter what, you’ll free us?  They said yeah, but we’re still stuck in the curse situation so it doesn’t really matter until you find a balloon that’s gonna delight us.  It doesn’t really matter at all.  Stocking Cap said don’t worry.  Said, just rest easy.  Then Stocking Cap asked for a bunch of other stuff; we want 40% of the Leisure Lands from the hill back to our farmlands, because…realized that we’re in a bargaining…it was a good position to be in.

 

So then…got the message up to Bun Hair.  Okay, we’re ready for our plan.  Let’s implement it.  Then every night for a couple weeks, Bun Hair would do all these loud noises from up top.  They said well, what is your Bun Hair doing?  Preparing some spells, and then finally they’re gonna be ready.  Maybe it was in a few weeks ‘cause again, I guess the time frame was more…but so, then what they did was they would raise the balloons and they would pop them.  The balloons had a little bit of stuff on there so it would look like a poof.  It would look like a poof, and so, then they’d report well, something happened with the spell and it went poof.  They said oh, good.  They said okay, it’s still gonna take a couple more nights, more and more buildup.  But eventually all of the troops outside went poof.

 

They said well, you’ve succeeded on the part of your bargain, so we grant you all those lands and your freedom, but we’re still stuck with this curse that you told us about, the double curse.  That’s when…not Bun Hair, but Old Stocking Cap said well, those were balloons.  ‘Cause they said we’re so delighted.  Oh, that’s the part I forgot.  They said…’cause again, someone was bothering me with…about the carousel.  They said, two quarters for your thoughts.  I said, for the carousel?  They said, when it’s fixed.  But they said oh, we’re so delighted all the armies are gone.  That’s when Bun Hair or Stocking Cap said well, those were all balloons; they weren’t troops at all, so you’ve been delighted by balloons, my monarchs.  They said wow, I guess…and then the curse was instantly broken.

 

Maybe it didn’t even need to tell them, which would have probably been better, because the monarchs, they did…still reinforced property lines they had agreed on pretty stringently and were kinda irritants to the couple.  But eventually they went back.  Bun Hair got to come down from the tower, and they actually got to use their picnic spot.  Their dinner was ruined, obviously.  Someone had…they had sent people to clean their place, though.  Don’t worry; they weren’t…the monarchs were rulers, but…annoying rulers, but not the worst.  That was it.  They went home, they returned to their lives, they had more land and…some Leisure Land of their own.  The pigeons, they found…the pigeons…then they flew off.  So, then I got outta there and eventually the carousel was fixed.

 

I think that was a disappointment to the pigeons ‘cause I never saw those pigeons there again.  They realized that they had a nest in the V part of the top of the K at Kmart.  So, I guess that’s a story I heard once from a couple pigeons on a carousel at a…I guess it was called Monarch Balloons or the Monarchs and the Balloons.  Great tale from pigeons to you.  Goodnight.  Thanks, everybody.

 

[END OF RECORDING]

(www.leahtranscribes.com)

Notable Language:

• Pigeon-Based Stories (PBS)
• Sen-changes
• Rattan hat

Notable Culture:

• “99 Red Balloons”
• Don’t Let the Pigeon Series
• Groundhog Day

Notable Talking Points:

• I think it was hot pink, I think
• Playing with sculpted balloons
• A Dual-Curse Situation (DCS)