I Sing of Teeth and the Mascot...
a verse collection
by Timons Esaias
for the 2001 Mass Challenge
My proposal for the mascot of Lair #1 of the Rogues, Rascals & Rapscallions is:
Tarbosaurus efremovi
(some authorities prefer Tyrannosaurus efremovi)
3 ½ tons of menacing mascot
standing 4 Rascals in height
Stopping by Max’s on a Rascal Evening
Who’ll mascot these? I think I know.
He’s trapped in the museum, though,
And will not see me stopping here
To watch these rooms fill up with smoke.
He’d like the meat, but think it queer
That we’d have all these veggies here
Between the beef and tasty pork
And that we’d let it cook and sear.
He’d make the very ground to shake
And munch the waitress, no mistake
But wives would know that we were safe
With efremovi on the case.
My argument is strong and deep,
But I have just five minutes’ keep
So I’ll move on.
Four Clerihews on Those I Did Not Choose
I hope you won’t be making a fuss,
I dissed Trisagus estraneus.
We don’t need a beetle
That isn’t a Beatle.
Todirhamphus enigma is a kingfisher,
Which is fine, I’m a thorough well-wisher.
But the name presents an air of mystery
That isn’t borne out by its actual history.
Without a picture of Thinobius exasperatus
In hose, high heels and cocktail dress
She’s just, to me, another weevil.
To make her mascot would be evil.
As guys we’d be interested in an elongata
But Thecopsammia we don’t need a lotta.
For what would be our story’s moral,
If we made a mascot of a stony coral???
Why the MEGAPHONE was Late
On the shore of Allegheny
By the turbid river water
Met a group without a mascot
A group of men who lacked a mascot
How they searched through Web and Textbook
Hard they hunted, long they pondered.
How to choose a worthy mascot?
One with wit who spurns an ascot?
Evil demons came to tempt them
Offered useless bugs aplenty
Tempted them with worms and urchins
Sapped their wills with snakes and salmon
Left them hopeless and adrift
Had them making up new species
Had them keeping in their feces
Had them almost picking tse-tses;
But one poor lad, their secretary
Cool to devils, ever wary,
Sent to Delphi for the answer
Sent the Oracle an emissary
And she took to heart the problem
Sought Apollo’s godly wisdom
Well she listened to his statements
Long she took to give her responses
But she came to give an answer
Told the lad, the secretary,
That the mascot should be heavy
As the whole group put together
That he should be interesting
Far too strong for any besting
"Seek him far past China’s Wall
If you seek him out at all!"
Thus she told our secretary
Our poor, dejected scribblary
How was he to get to China?
Past the big Pacific water?
So he sent off to Dodona
And to Ephesus and Siwa
Every oracle and seer
All replied with one intent
"What part of Delphi’s don’t you get??
Take yourself to Mongol pastures
Find the creature that you’re after.
What if you should die in seeking?
Rascals can still go on meeting,
Dan can send the database
Put things right and set the pace
Buckle on your shield and armor
Seek the mascot, as you oughter!!"
So he took the quest they’d offered,
Made his way through modern China,
Took the road to Ulan Bator
Looked around for beasts our group-size
All he saw were prancing ponies
And some sheep with wistful faces
Not the kind of thing we needed
But a vision came upon him
Rascals meeting at the Tavern
Eating meat and getting more,
"That’s it!" he said, "A carnivore!!"
Then he took his invitation
Found in it more inspiration
"Not just any carnivore!
What we need’s a dinosaur!!"
So he joined an expedition
Worked beside them, dug their trenches
And he found the long-sought object
This, in fact, [immortal poet displays replica] or something like it.
Thus ends our tale of pain and sorrow
And I hope that on the morrow
Your poor secretary’s not
The one who’s keeping Elvis’s snot.
The Lair #1 Mascot Anthem
[sung to a familiar air]
‘Twas somewhere near the Yucatan
A glorious summer day
When Tarbosaurus stood and stretched
And set out on his way.
He wanted food, he wanted meat
Like Rascals of today,
He did not know, How could he know?
He was the last ‘osaur.
He was the last ‘osaur,
He was the last ‘osaur,
It saddens us to think in sooth
He was the last ‘osaur.
His kind had dined on everything
They’d eaten quite a lot.
They’d chased down all the Allosaurs
And swallowed all they got.
The stegosaurs had been their lunch,
Then pterosaur tartare;
And none foresaw his special fate
To be the last ‘osaur.
He was the last ‘osaur,
He was the last ‘osaur,
It saddens us to think in sooth
He was the last ‘osaur.
They dined on bigger predators
Velociraptors, too;
They ate the bronts, the orthodonts,
And our ancestors, too.
They finished off the herbivores
They emptied out the sea
They didn’t eat our mascot, though,
Of tougher stuff was he.
He was the last ‘osaur,
He was the last ‘osaur,
It saddens us to think in sooth
He was the last ‘osaur.
He ate the big, he ate the small
The fat, the fit, the thin.
He ate the dino next to him,
He ate both kith and kin.
Till finally he was alone,
And overhead a star,
And now the truth begins to dawn:
He’d gone a bit too far.
He was the last ‘osaur,
He was the last ‘osaur,
It saddens us to think in sooth
He was the last ‘osaur.
Two mascot candidates in serious need of a Max’s buffet.