Guest Blog by Tim, with Special Guest Star Jeff Goldblum

Sometimes I don't fully appreciate how weird and wonderful my friends are, both online and IRL. They find humor and joy in the strangest of places and encounters, and that's what makes life so incredibly interesting. I was given a reminder of this late Saturday night, as my Twitter buddy/former fellow J-towner Tim sent me a Facebook message:

DUDE.
I just had an epic duel with a fly.

What followed was a story so hilariously harrowing that I had to share it with the world. Tim wrote it up for me in very short order. I must note that we discussed the tiny bit of, um, slightly "coarse language" at the very end of this, the type not normally found on this blog, and after some discussion decided it really completes the story. So I apologize if anyone's sensibilities are offended, but hey, the story's SO worth it.

And so without further ado, I present Goldblum's End by Tim Snyder.

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Let me preface this account with a bit of an admission. I'm no “Star Wars Lightsaber Master” or “Lord of the Rings Duel Fanatic,” but I was hella' pumped over what transpired in the mirror area in my apartment's bedroom. In fact, the limits of my “swordsmanship” understanding extend as far as fighting with foam swords for two years (a fine hobby if you get rid of all that roleplaying fluff).

It's about eleven thirty at night on November 7. I'm sitting at my computer, enjoying the Internets' splendor. I suddenly hear the cacophonous hum of an insect's wings nearby. I grab the only swingable thing near me, a huge pad of newsprint paper, and go to the source of the sound. I spot the creature instantly: as I thought, a bug. I kept my distance, as it was unclear just yet if the little guy was a hornet or just a giant fly.

As luck would have it, I stood face to thorax with a giant fly.

It was perched on the mirror until I rose my pad to smash it against its platform. Once airborne, I could tell that my unwieldy art supplies would do nothing to this winged little bugger. I decided on a tactical retreat once I figured that nothing in my room was up to snuff for the task of fly-slaying.

I approached my roommate and his friend, then, who were playing a guitar and a bass.

“Hey, do you guys have like a flyswatter or something? There's this giant fly on the mirror.”

My roommate laughed.

“Oh,” he said after a brief coughing session, “you mean Jeff Goldblum.”

Jeff Goldblum. Har har.

He handed me a newspaper and wished me good tidings in the battle ahead, not in the traditional ways of wishing my safe return and whatnot.

Oh heavens no. He just said, “go kill it.”

My roommate and his friend returned to their music, providing me with a little psych-up. Rolled-up newspaper in hand, I took up position before the mirror, and nudged the door shut. I realized that what I was going to do would look hardcore against an opponent not a fraction of my size, but just ridiculous against something as tiny as a fly.

Feet T'd off like a fencer, knees bent, offhand up to slap the fly, newspaper up and wrist making small circles, I remembered what it was like to hit someone with something, and the whole kids-beating-each-other-with-foam-swords thing came back to me like riding a bike. Or maybe a triceratops.

The battle began. Buzzing wings and whining guitar strings blended together, the percussive snaps of my weapon meeting solid surface throwing snare hits that punctuated every subtle motion with a big, bold exclamation point. Alas, for each hit, a miss was all that waited beneath.

That's not to say I didn't absolutely nail the thing a few times, though. Goldblum took his blows like a champ, and came back for a few more. After three, though, he started feeling the wrath.

“Did you kill it,” my roommate yelled into the room.

“I got it limping!”

I heard him mutter from the living room, “... How does a fly limp?”

“It's an expression,” I yelled after yet another angry slap at the mirror.

Each impact put more and more of that animalistic sheen into my eyes. It took maybe five more swings to bring it down flat on the medicine cabinet's top. I went for the terminal blow, but missed. Instead, the fly, perhaps in a diversionary tactic, spun in circles on its back. I went to the living room and herded in my roommate and his friend to introduce them to my fly little fly.

I hit at it again. This time, however, he didn't dance; instead, Goldblum made for his great escape. My roommate's friend took the newspaper and smashed the grounded fly, hopes likely as trashed as its squirming body was. It bounced off the ground, to the center of the three of us. I gave it the final blow, a vicious curbstomping that would make anyone cringe.

I kept stomping on it, maybe for effect, maybe because I really didn't think that'd kill it. It took my roommate saying, “It's dead dude, it's dead,” to stop and lift my foot to view the corpse beneath me.

“Aw, Tim. Now you got raisin juice on your foot.”

Later that night, my roommate played Taps for the fly. I wasn't present.

Goldblum was a dick, anyways.