In which Hieronymus Jackson discovers his damsel in distress, Part 1
Category: Writing and Poetry

As you all know, Hieronymus Jackson is the world's foremost navigator of all anatomical alleys and thoroughfares to the female orgasm. This knowledge has been gainfully won, not just with my superabundance of charm and man-beauty, but also with a modest application of genius. Concerning the carnal arts, I know that you— my faithful Hieronymaniacs— are nothing like the numerous rabble: those nine-to-fivers doing the two-backed beast in one mandatory minute. Nor are you like those wannabe pornographers, who pass off their over-arted inertia for passion. Let me, Hieronymus Jackson, put away the palming hands of my mind and speak to you now plainly. Let me provide you with this guiding alpha-star born from the sexual circuits of my left-coasted Shangri-L.A.

As per my usual habit, I awoke one fine afternoon with no idea of where I was. My powers of perception, always razor keen, further told me that I had no idea of who I was. Regardless of identity, I was staring at a blue sky, and from there, my deductive mind took command.

CROM! A master burglar has stolen my house from right over me!

It was with a considerable stroke of luck that I realized, just then, that I was Hieronymus Jackson and therefore did not own a house, or even rent an apartment or any residence in the indoor fashion of our time. The wave of relief that washed over me cannot be overestimated, and I proceeded to more pressing issues of the moment.

Of the local setting before me, Hieronymus Jackson is not one to wax masturbatingly about nature. In fact, the odds of me describing the boring-ass scenery are about the same odds of me wearing a floral muumuu in public: slim to none. I chortled to myself and looked around.

Damn. I was wearing a floral muumuu, now terminating in lashes along the waist and indelicately revealing my jockeys half-cured in sweat, urine, and miscellanea. I sat on the grass by the small lake in Echo Park, which, if you don't know the Los, is a hotbed of incipient Bolshevism. Of my presence on this bucolic scene, the general consensus among the local communards was one of dainty contempt. In the lake, a hipster couple in a paddle boat caught sight of me, and with their connubial bliss irretrievably defiled, they pedaled their vessel away while shooting wary glances from their stern, as if the possibility that I might jump in the water and board them was not remote. What can I say? Class: it simply can't be taught.

Only that most august of the avian class comported itself with poise. I speak, of course, of the duck. On my port side, a mallard and her five little ducklings waddled past not a yard from me, momma and kiddies each dignifying my company with a quick nod and a quack before dipping into the water and embarking on a voyage to the farthest niches of the unmapped universe, or maybe just to the other side of the pond.

Hieronymus Jackson is friend to the duck. The duck does not espouse any debunked ideologies and is unlikely to challenge Hieronymus Jackson in word battle. Above all, the duck has a code. A duck can swim. A duck can fly. A duck can even fish, and water just rolls right off its back. The only thing I can't do is fly.

But fly I did, on two feet, from the park and down Sunset Boulevard. It was there, at the Edendale Library, that I saw the love of my life…

To be continued...

1:30 AM - 5 Comments - 12 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Hieronymus Jackson ends this day
Category: Writing and Poetry

The thing about ninjutsu is that it is a constant and demanding discipline. For years, Hieronymus Jackson practiced these dark arts for fear of being overtaken by the younger generation of ninjas. They were good— almost too good— but not quite good enough. Before me lies about a billion would-be ninjas couched in the unbottomed grave of eternity.

Still, after it's all said and done, one begins to wonder whether it was all worth it. Perhaps my time could have been better spent in the commerce of like minds: poets, pirates, Gandalf. But no: I found the luster of glory too keen, was spurred by the lowest and least superbeasted captain of Moloch, spent my rough-hewn years powering the abrasion wheels of toil, cutting my soul into a hard diamond of black-clad annihilation, practicing my aged scoundrel arts all the while teetering atop the cuspid point over an all-voracious zero, which elaborately yawns its twice-tiered jaws and invites me, you, all to a niche of hell nine million octaves below middle C.

And so, for now, Hieronymus Jackson listens to the lone music of this day's end, the faint notes of the moon hauling another tide on her brawn shoulders, the upward avalanche of loitering stars, the hours drumming a systole of useless labors, a diastole of petty leisures; and along the sun's former and opposite horizon beats the leaden plumes of hatchling night.

Because the night is like a ninja.




Happy Valentine's Day to all you eternal, uncoupled Peter Pans of this Shangri-L.A.

11:53 PM - 9 Comments - 13 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Hieronymus Jackson discusses new technology
Category: Writing and Poetry

If you were a half million light-years from here and looked back this way, you would see a huge, swirling community of 400 billion stars. And if each of these stars could evolve a conscious mind, they would probably all be thinking the same thing: I am special, I am unique among stars, and I am definitely not like these other dildos. Amid the company of these stars, there are also gases, dust, plasma, heavy elements, and a mysterious, invisible mass known as 'dark matter', which theoretically composes more than 90% of all the matter in the universe. No one knows what dark matter really is, but its existence can be inferred from its effects on neighboring bodies. This celestial system, most of which we cannot see and do not know, is called the Milky Way Galaxy, home of the worst country music in the universe. Within this spiral galaxy is a yellow star that harbors a planet, where matter has actually evolved conscious minds, 6.5 billion of which believe that they are special, unique, and definitely not like the dildo going 45 on the freeway. Much, too, of this mindful stuff is dark, mysterious, and even invisible to the eye. Perhaps a whole cosmos within them can be inferred to exist with a careful study of their effects.

Unfortunately, this conscious matter is not as predictable as country music. These thinking units do affect and are affected by a limitless sum of immeasurable, weak-acting factors, variables, and events that cannot be duplicated for repeated testing in a controlled environment. Put simply: chicks dig Hieronymus Jackson. Put another way: history is sometimes an inferential study; at other times, it is power's poetry sanctified into certainty; but history is not and has never been an experimental science.

Unless, of course, you have a time machine, like the one built by Ozymandias Jackson in the year 47,220...

8:06 AM - 42 Comments - 60 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Theophrastus Jackson wins the big stakes game: Part 2
Category: Writing and Poetry

As a wise man once said in the Bible, thou shalt not defy Theophrastus Jackson, or he shalt garrote thee with a loop of thine own intestines, fucknut. So if Theophrastus Jackson thinks that you've just become as lucky as a leprechaun, you don't dicker with details; you grab a green hat, take up an Irish brogue, and do a fucking Riverdance. But more than anything, you're just stoked as shit that you don't have a hand shoved in your guts looking for a weapon.

The name's Hieronymus F. Jackson, Los Angeles-based leprechaun and Lord of the Dance.

Awash in poker winnings, my grandfather Theophrastus Jackson rambled out of the Golden Gopher and greeted the afternoon sun with fresh foul designs on his mind. Behind him was his seven-year-old lucky charm: me. We walked briskly and shared a moment of pensive reflection.

-- HOT SON OF A BITCH, Theophrastus Jackson roared. Finally, there's some justice in this foolish world. It's high time I had some luck.
-- Yes, sir.
-- You know, Buddha owed me big time, the insufferable dolt. This luck's long fucking overdue.
-- Yes, sir.
-- Way overdue!
-- Uh-huh.
-- FUCK!

These were pretty wild claims from a man who could eat live grenades for lunch and suffer maybe a bit of gas afterwards. But if my grandfather's bowels and sense of entitlement knew no bounds, then so did his generosity:

-- I shall use this luck for the greater good of FUCKING HUMANITY!
-- Yes, sir.

And his greed:

-- But first, I shall make a TRILLION DOLLARS!!!
-- What?

We jumped into my grandfather's car, a carnivorous '74 Chevy Nova that fed on a diet of gasoline, man-flesh, and fear. Cranking its bad-ass 350 V8 engine, the world's first soon-to-be trillionaire howled from out the window:

-- HI HO, THEOPHRASTOMOBILE, AWAY!!!!

"The Nova growled to life, from hood to trunk
Shaking like a wet hound drying; and then
The Hannibal of Hollywood yanked hard
Its manual stick, as reins taut against
Some unstabled beast not broken to bit.
With both Jacksons firmly saddled atop
The withers of this automotive warg,
The Theophrastomobile hearkened to its
Fell warden's call, reared on its hinder wheels,
And blasted headlong off with the wanton
Power of one hundred foul Dungeon Masters
Down the wine-dark roads of Los Angeles,
Beyond the other side of the rainbow,
To the fabled home of Dodgers baseball..."

-- Excerpt from 'The Hieronymiad' by Hieronymus Jackson & Harry Hong, canto MMMCVIII, verses 38-39.

2:22 AM - 20 Comments - 39 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Theophrastus Jackson wins the big stakes game: Prelude to Part 2
Category: Writing and Poetry

"O Muse!
Tell me of two boys, of Jacksons young and old:
The first, Theophrastus, champion of Norman shores
And shadowed Teuton wood, the prince of shirks
And footloose slackers, and his unsired ward,
A grandson, twice-fatherless bastard squire
Hieronymus Jackson. Both bandidos
In a town of tinsel and tar, the City of Angels
And womb to heroes, these twin and too-soon
Unmothered manlings had at long last struck
The motherfucking jackpot fo shizzle..."

Excerpt from "The Hieronymiad" by Hieronymus Jackson & Harry Hong, canto MMMCVIII, verse 1-2.

4:30 AM - 34 Comments - 57 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Hieronymus Jackson makes himself clear
Category: Writing and Poetry

As I prepare the latest chapter of the story of Theophrastus Jackson for next week, I feel the need to make myself clear. As a person of vast intelligence (my IQ > 50), I have a tendency to use large words. Adding to this confusion is the fact that English is not my first language; it is my thirtieth, and I am still familiarizing myself with your indigenous slang, usages, and idioms. I apologize to all my 'homies' if my writing has been at times incomprehensible, but I have a habit of muddling my English with my Italian, my Italian with my Urdu, my Urdu with my Bantu, and on and on. I find it all almost too embarrassing for words. As a result, I have provided for reference purposes this small glossary, which you may use to understand some of my own esoteric phrases. Please feel free to copy and paste this primer onto your own site or, better yet, use as your computer's new desktop picture. I greatly appreciate your patience. The only thing that keeps me firmly grounded during this linguistic pupa stage is your support and my untiring sense of false modesty.

Cheers,
Hieronymus Jackson.


THE HIERONYMUS JACKSON GLOSSARY:

ALPHA-MALE: 1. One of a class of male animal who dominates over other males for the gain of resources and/or sexual favor. Example: in humans, Hieronymus Jackson; in gerbils, also Hieronymus Jackson.

HARLOT: 1. Archaic: Somebody who receives money in return for sexual intercourse or other sex acts. Usage: "'No, Mr. Jackson,' said the HARLOT, 'I do not accept traveler's checks'".

HIERONYMIAD: 1. n. The 30,000-page epic poem of the life and times of Hieronymus Jackson written by Hieronymus Jackson, reputed to be of greater literary worth than Homer's 'The Iliad' & 'The Odyssey', Dante's 'Divine Comedy', and Rowling's 'Harry Potter' series.

HIERONYMOLOGY: 1. n. The science of Hieronymus Jackson. 2. The science of sexxxing. 3. The science of kicking ass and taking names. 4. The science of being extraordinarily super-dope.

HIERONYMOJACKSOPHILIA: 1. n. An intense love for Hieronymus Jackson. 2. The regular state of the female human or gerbil. 3. A debilitating and incurable disease of women that requires the regular transfusions of Hieronymus Jackson's sperm into the vagina, mouth, and/or anus.

HIERONYMOJACKSOPHILIAC: 1. n. A lover of Hieronymus Jackson. Synonym: woman. 2. A person with hieronymojacksophilia. Synonym: woman. 3. A regular reader of the writings of Hieronymus Jackson. Synonyms: intellectual, connoisseur, the greatest person in the world (besides Hieronymus Jackson).

HIERONYMOJACKSOPHOBE: 1. n. A person or thing with hieronymojacksonphobia. Synonyms: man, gerbil, small tree, donut.

HIERONYMOJACKSOPHOBIA: 1. n. An intense fear of Hieronymus Jackson. Synonyms: common sense, wisdom, sagacity.

HOMOSEXUAL: 1. n. A person who is sexually attracted to members of his or her own sex. Usage: "'I can do this', said Hieronymus Jackson as he put on his favorite red pumps, 'because I am the least HOMOSEXUAL man in the universe'". 2. Any formerly heterosexual man who realizes some sex is better than none because all women prefer Hieronymus Jackson. 3. The entire human male population (except guess who?). Also see: lesbian.

LESBIAN: 1. n. Any women who has never met Hieronymus Jackson. 2. Any woman who spurns the sexual entreaties of Hieronymus Jackson. Synonyms: dyke, bitch, why?

LOSER: 1. Any person who is not Hieronymus Jackson. Antonym: Hieronymus Jackson. 2. Any person or thing that opposes Hieronymus Jackson. 3. Any person who is about two seconds away from death due to opposition to Hieronymus Jackson. Synonyms: idiot, nincompoop, walking dead man.

WINNER: 1. Any person who is Hieronymus Jackson. Synonyms: Hieronymus Jackson, not you, me, donut.

3:02 AM - 37 Comments - 52 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Theophrastus Jackson wins the big stakes game: Part I
Category: Writing and Poetry

Let me tell you about my grandfather Theophrastus Jackson: a man, who in the masculine annals of manhood, was unmanned by no man (but me). As a soldier with the 82nd Airborne in World War Two, my grandfather dropped into Normandy without a parachute and slayed a thousand Philistines with a donkey's jawbone. After the war, he worked as a lumberjack, safari guide, gunrunner, spy-hunter, circus strongman, luchador, whale harpooneer, and bouncer in every red-light district from Bogota to Phuket. In his spare time, he walked across the Sahara on his hands, climbed Mount Everest by accident, and thrashed Ernest Hemingway in Havana with a manure-filled sock.

Astonishingly, even my own exploits can't compare to those of the elder Jackson. But what I may lack in actual deeds, I make up for by being alive-- whereas Theophrastus Jackson is as dead as decorum-- so I guess I get to tell the FUCKING TRUTH in any way I GODDAMN WELL PLEASE, AIGHT?

The name's Hieronymus F. Jackson, inventor of sex.

When I was but a wee boy and galactic supremacy was just a faint dream, I lived here in Los Angeles with Theophrastus Jackson. I was seven, and my grandfather had cracked his seventh decade and was still cracking skulls many decades younger, some even belonging to men. He was still unrivaled as a human specimen, perhaps because his claim on humanity was doubtful at best. His frame was plated with mounds of tectonic muscle. He had forearms that you'd only expect to see on a cartoon sailor or champion masturbator. And atop his massive shoulders sat a hoary face wreathed with bristles and breakfast. To be anything like Theophrastus Jackson, you'd have to be bitten by a radioactive bulldozer and then transmogrify into a half-man, half-bulldozer superhero.

While fatling princes romped puppily in the park, I hung out with my grandfather at musky dens of man-sport: horse tracks, boxing gyms, tractor pulls, strip joints. One day, we were in the back room of the Golden Gopher, downtown's guttermost dive. It was my first time watching my grandfather at his monthly poker game. Theophrastus Jackson was playing Texas Hold 'Em against a quintet of hell's own half-sons. Belching mephitic fume and drinking lakes of fire, they all looked as if some horrible demon had gobbled them up, crapped them out, and offered them a deck of cards to play out their purgatory. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. But in this City of Angels, that's an oxymoron.

One of the demon spawn turned to me and flinched.

--What the FUCK is THAT? he asked.

Theophrastus Jackson glanced to me. In a good mood, which was still pretty foul, he called me 'boy' or 'kid'. Sometimes, I wondered if he knew my real name or if it was my real name at all. So maybe because he couldn't remember or didnt care, he replied:

--That's my lucky charm.

This was sarcasm. He'd been losing since the night before and the night before that and before that even.

--Lucky charm, my ass.
--Ain't it a school day?
--What day is it?
--Why don't get a goddamned rabbit's foot instead?
--Thursday?
--Or try sticking a horseshoe up your ass, said the last guy. And then they laughed.

Now usually, anyone who laughed at Theophrastus Jackson soon discovered the shortest line between themselves and the upper ionosphere. My grandfather held them hard with his eyes, blew his nose in his hand, and had lunch. Then that hand snapped out and clapped on the last guy's face. Theophrastus Jackson hoisted the guy off his chair and within an inch of his own face. The man's eye peeked out between two brawn fingers, his head fully encompassed like a nerf ball. My grandfather growled:

--I USED TO STICK GUYS LIKE YOU UP MY ASS IN THE JOINT. THAT'S THE LAST TIME THEY WERE EVER FUCKING SEEN.

A dense hush was the only thing that saved them all from an imminent Theophrastian doom (most likely the aforementioned ass-oblivion). My grandfather released his captive, who fled in a stool-softening panic. I hear that guy's doing okay now, though he still suffers from a mysterious ailment known only as theophrastojacksophobia.

--AND IT'S WEDNESDAY, YOU LUMBER-HEADED PUNKS, added my grandfather.

He wiped his snotty hand on the guy next to him. This would've been a lot funnier if the guy next to him hadn't been me.

And it was Saturday, goddamnit.

Then without reason, those chance-gods that govern us all suddenly smiled upon Theophrastus Jackson, probably out of sheer terror. With a shuffle of deck and deal of cards, as chips clicked and skipped to the tune of victory, my grandfather's kicker held up and he won; and then the rainbow flushed with hearts on runners and he won; and then his wired paints turned trips on the river and he won; and he doubled up again with a boat, then again with a straight, until the last pot was raked, and in one hour of a three-night bender, Theophrastus Jackson sat alone, his Jolly Roger pitched atop a hill of dead presidents. It was the most money he had ever collected in poker at the time, and he didn't need to count it to know it, because he'd always lost in poker. This was just pure dumb luck.

My grandfather massaged his whiskers, picked out what appeared to be a hot dog, and popped it his mouth. His gray eyes bore holes in me as he ruminated. He didn't want to know to whom or what he owed this luck so he could thank this whom or what; he wanted to know the whom or what to use its luck to get the fuck whomever and whatever he wanted.

Counting out with his fingers, my grandfather listed three possible answers:

1. God.
2. Karma.
3. Chance.

But certainly God wasn't going to do him any favors. Back in '68, Theophrastus Jackson had beat up God and then called him a 'homo'. Ever since, my grandfather claimed his luck had taken a catastrophic turn for the worse, and he vowed to make God pay for all of this 'passive-aggressive bullshit'.

It couldn't be karma either. Whatever the rating system, Theophrastus Jackson had maxed out on his allowable karmic debt years ago. If anything, my grandfather owed an overdue balance unmatched in the history of enlightenment. He was just lucky he could still walk around without the universe throwing a meteorite at his balls.

And so this left chance. But, as you know, chance sometimes pulls a Scorpio on our little friend, the human brain. This buddy of ours has been the number-one tool on earth for at least the last eleven years, and the strength of this delightful instrument-- which gave us rocket bombs and Rocky V-- is seeking and finding patterns. Its ability to discern cause and effect gave birth to the method of science, unparalleled in its explanatory powers and utterly useless for getting good pizza in L.A. However, the template that our friend lays on the world is likely to fail us when no patterns are found. Our little friend may, in fact, force a biased pattern on random reality, particularly when that reality gives up $2000 in one hour. Our little friend may even go further by relating two coincidences-- like a grandson's presence and gambling triumph-- into cause and effect, and then even imbue the token quasi-cause with a talismanic significance. And to Theophrastus Jackson's friendly little brain, that token, that talisman, that source of good luck-- at least temporarily-- was me, his grandson Hieronymus Jackson.

Theophrastus Jackson grabbed my hand, his eyes afire with all the dreams of Croesus.

--LET'S GO, BOY! MWAH-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HAAAAA!!!!!!

And this malevolent Aladdin and his magic lamp were off.

To be continued...

4:44 AM - 23 Comments - 31 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Hieronymus Jackson talks about his family
Category: Writing and Poetry

If Hieronymus Jackson is anything, he is a man of good taste. My ability to discern subtle nuances and appreciate complexity in art, music, literature, and all forms of cultural production is unparalleled, perhaps in all of history. As such, I almost never confuse external appearance with intrinsic quality. That's because I never consider intrinsic quality in the first place. This is especially true in my judgment of people, particularly women. Luckily, all my impressions— even my most baseless, wild-assed surmises— happen to always be true. So as an authority on anything I choose to talk about, I direct this message to you men out there. This is not a slight to you women, who are all awesome, even those who aren't perfect 10's. But this particular message is aimed towards the penised sex.

I ask you fine men to gaze deep into your soul's unplumbed inner precincts and answer this metaphysical puzzle: why are you all such unfathomable douche-bags? I realize that not everyone can be an alpha-male, and that out of us alpha-males, only one can be Hieronymus Jackson; but really, what the fuck happened to the brass balls of the modern man? Maybe I'm being unjust, but unless you can coax a clitoris to bud from its hood like that alien bursts out of John Hurt's chest, you need to SHUT THE FUCK UP cuz you DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING so LISTEN UP before I BITCH-SLAP you to OBLIVION.

That's better. Now, let me provide you with a manful magnetic pole to guide your moral compass. Let me tell you about my grandfather Theophrastus Jackson.

Theophrastus Jackson was a man of volcanic masculinities. He had hair growing out of every part of his body; even things he touched would grow hair. Like me, Theophrastus Jackson didn't suffer fools gladly. Whenever I pissed him off, my grandfather used to take a live cow and beat me with it. One time, this guy called my grandfather 'Ted'. Big mistake: that poor shmuck was the first human ever to travel in outer space, years before Yuri Gagarin.

But my grandfather wasn't all piss and vinegar. For fun, he liked to drink whiskey, punch trees, and fight in World War Two. Theophrastus Jackson had a hard, thousand-yard stare known as 'The Stool-Softener' that turned brave German infantrymen into unwilling smell-o-visions. He used to stare at me, and when I wasn't crapping my own pants, I was beating myself with a cow for being such a rank pussy. Ironically, my grandfather's stare had the opposite effect on women. His penis— which he called 'Mr. Entertainment'— can claim authorship of millions of lazy, greedy brats; you may know them as the baby-boomers.

Anyway, Theophrastus Jackson passed away last year. When he was lying on his deathbed, do you think he cried and moaned like a wee bitch-child? You bet your fucking ass he did. And I gotta tell you there's nothing funnier in this whole world than seeing a grown man cry, particularly when he's such an iron-assed, unalloyed motherfucker like Theophrastus Jackson. Don't get me wrong; I really loved my grandfather. But if he ever heard me say the word 'love', he'd come right back from whatever hole in hell he's at, and then watch out cuz here comes that fucking cow again.

2:23 AM - 43 Comments - 45 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Ozymandias Jackson prepares for war
Category: Writing and Poetry

In a longitudinal study by historians of the year 47,220, the Imperial Jackson family was newly deemed the stupidest ruling dynasty ever, having just ousted the former titleholder for 48 straight millenia, an obscure American clan from the planet Earth. In the individuals category of the same study, Ozymandias Jackson was scientifically calculated as the biggest nincompoop in leadership history, with a record-shattering mark of 49.3 kilo-Dubyas per second (kD/s).

The talk on the intergalactic grapevine was that these findings had provoked the Sixth Hieronymine Jihad. True, the king's vocabulary did not include many words— like 'dignity' or 'morality' or 'cat'— and it certainly did not include 'forgiveness'; so it was no surprise to anyone when historians quickly found themselves penciled into the royal black book.

On the planet Hieronyma at the imperial palace, Ozymandias Jackson brooded on the Saturnine Hibiscus Throne. This whole business of history had put him in a foul mood. Whenever he felt blue, the king liked to dabble in some of his favorite hobbies: playing the banjo, writing haikus, exercising limitless unchecked power. Today, however, he was eating. Ozymandias Jackson had just finished his first bushel of uncooked barley and now tore into his second.

Indeed, thought Ozymandias Jackson, I will destroy these past-mongering historians as easily as I digest these puny cereal grains.

The king suddenly gagged, coughed, and shot a stricken look at the chancellor by his throne.

The chancellor sighed. His primary duty in the court, besides administering the domestic and foreign policies of the Hieronymine Empire, was to smack the king on the back whenever he choked on his food. It was a task that was performed, on the average, about once every forty-five minutes. In fact, the chancellor had last hit Ozymandias not an hour ago during the Schadenfreudian church service, when his highness devoured 36 pounds of communion wafers, the congregation's entire year's supply. Besides communion wafers, Ozymandias Jackson also held the intergalactic eating records for hamburgers, hot dogs, matzo balls, oysters, caviar, eels, pheasant, quail, cows, camels, turduckens, bananas, prunes, yams, oats, hay, ice cream, cotton candy, candy canes, candy bars, and candy bar wrappers. Incidentally, all these gustatory triumphs were achieved unwittingly; Ozymandias just happened to be a very fast eater. It also didn't hurt that the king had received a surgical procedure that allowed him to swallow and breathe at the same time. Competitive eaters across the universe grumbled at this breach of their hallowed rules, but the operation was simply a practical necessity, as the king had a habit of passing out in the midst of his feeding frenzies.

The chancellor coiled back and clapped Ozymandias on the back. Pellets of barley blasted out of the king's maw and skidded across the floor. Before any of the courtiers could sweep them up, the king dove down and gathered them back into his mouth. He chewed deliberately, swallowed, stood up, belched, and declared:

Prepare my space cruiser— there's jihading to be done.

And so Ozymandias Jackson, his chancellor, his entire privy council, his army, his logistics crew, and the royal harem all boarded the Deuteronomy II, the Hieronymine King's recently rebuilt battle dreadnought.

Thus was the genesis of the Sixth Hieronymine Jihad.

2:08 AM - 22 Comments - 22 Kudos - Add Comment

In which Hieronymus Jackson dreams of the future REDUX
Category: Writing and Poetry

The world is unjust. Why? Because God is unjust. Why? Because God has succeeded in crashing Hieronymus Jackson's hard drive. So while we all mourn the loss to world literature— and while Hieronymus Jackson hunts down and kicks God's ass— let us read this reprint blog, a thread which will be continued. Let us pray that God never does something so stupid as to cross Hieronymus Jackson again. Enjoy....

In the Hieronymine revolutionary calendar year of our Lord Hieronymus Jackson 47,220...

Oxymandias XIV— "The Magnificent", the Hiero King, the son of Rhadamanthus III and his fourth concubine Goneril, scion of the Family Jackson, Hieronymese Imperator of the Known and Unknown Universes, 45th heir descendent of Hieronymus I, presider of the Saturnine Hibiscus Throne on the Planet Hieronyma, Pontifex Maximus of the Hieronymist state religion of Schadenfreudianism— was bored as shit. Indeed, Ozymandias Jackson thought, the universe can be so fucking dull.

He summoned his court dwarf into the throne room. As the dwarf waddled into the chambers, the king let out a shriek, pounced out from behind a tapestry, and kicked his dwarf in the balls. But it was no use. Both dwarf and king had lost their former zeal for the pastime. Even the royal household could barely manage a round of thunderous laughter before lapsing back to an embarassed silence. The chamberlain, the finance minister, the minnesangers, the eunuch scribes, the concubines, and a champion merengue dancer— the king's best friend— all slumped back. Someone coughed.

The king groaned. The court had just completed a banjo-playing contest, which Ozymandias had won for the tenth straight time. But the king was bored of his mastery of the banjo. It had been six hours since the end of the Fifth Hieronymine Jihad. Perhaps the universe was ripe for another war. Ozymandias called his minister of peace, a grossly obese marshal so ladened with ribbons and medals that he had to be craned in from the roof skylight.

What, asked the king, is the disposition of my enemies?

You mean, since six hours ago? the marshal asked.

The marshal cleared his throat and looked around the court for any sign. Finding none, he reported, through one of his flapping chins, that the Virtuemongers were imprisoned, the Post-Schadenfreudians were eradicated, and the Majoritarian Party was reduced to a Minoritarian Party.

The king huffed. Could we not make some new enemies?

In fact, all enemies of the Hieronymese sovereign were creations of the sovereign's agents. Alas, mused the king. One of the side effects of benevolent dictatorial rule: too much damn happiness.

Just make more bad guys, said the king, and the marshal was winched out. Ozymandias leapt from his throne and drew his atomic rapier. Its blade edge was a mere atom's width, could shear through anything, and was forged of the hardest metal in the universe, Hieronyminium, also used in ballpoint pens and codpieces.

The king whipped his sword around in ever widening orbits and eyed each of his courtiers, each squirming under his regal scrutiny.

You, said the king to a footman. Come here.

The footman looked around in discreet panic. Me?

Everyone in the court leaned perceptibly away from the stricken man as if he had erupted a silent fart they had only now detected.

Yes, you, said Ozymandias. Don't worry. I'm not going to chop your head off.

This was precisely what Ozymandias was going to do. He had a habit, when at war, to inaugurate the martial proceedings with an informal and arbitrary beheading. The tradition actually began by chance when the king accidentally lopped off the head of his royal food taster on an errant back swing. Since then, Ozymandias felt obliged to decapitate more cronies lest his own court realize he had fucked up the first time. Afterall, it is the duty of the Hiero King to preserve the dignity of that position at all costs. And the king does not fuck up.

Of course, the rumor around the universe was the king had fucked up. And the fuck-ups weren't restricted to poor sword play either. During the Fifth Hieronymine Jihad, Ozymandias Jackson had taken the helm of a dreadnought cruiser fully detailed with elite Hieronymese troopers and logistics crew of one million and, upon trying to park the ship in orbit, backed it into the mouth of a black hole. The king was rescued, but the ship and entire crew crossed the event horizon and were all atomically disarticulated. In fact, this incident had occurred not ten hours ago.

Ozymandias Jackson is no fuck-up, thought Ozymandias Jackson as he swung his sword at the fleeing footman. They rounded the court three times before the king fell to his knees heaving for air. He felt like he was going to puke and shit in his pants at the same time. If that happens again, thought the king, I'm going to be very disappointed with that footman. Very disappointed.

Ozymandias Jackson became very disappointed.

Ozymandias Jackson had plans of becoming even more famous than his wise and brilliant ancestor Hieronymus Jackson. Ozymandias Jackson was going to be even greater, and not just in his own universe either.

12:09 AM - 14 Comments - 12 Kudos - Add Comment