Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Houseless

HOUSELESS, adj. Having paid all taxes on household goods.

2008 Update:  Lacking a gathering place for heirs or a shelter from envy.

For every evil, there's a cure
For gluttony, drink in place of food
For Envy there's allure
For Sloth there's the reflective mood 
For Lust, there's speech
For Wrath, a blow against the head
For Greed, there's reach
And for Pride, there is the dead.

Which is my way of wishing a happy birthday to the mouldering corpse of Ambrose Bierce.

26 comments:

TLP said...

Houseless: Downsizing.

TLP said...

Oh, and happy , er,...birthdate to the corpse.

Anonymous said...

houseless - A week without TV programming that features Hugh Laurie.

Jamie Dawn said...

"Drink in place of food"????
I don't think so!!!!

Houseless: I got nothin'

mireille said...

Happy Birthday, Ambrose. You're lookin' a little fleshless.

Houseless: thinning tax roles and human misery.

xoxo

Anonymous said...

Houseless -- us. We live in a condo! :)

Doug The Una said...

Rightsizing, TLP. And Ambrose says "Thanks, blogmama!."

Poobah, my life, in other words.

Not truffles, JD. Not truffles!

Mireille, that's actually a symptom of having a house. And a Senate.

Quilly, as Merle Haggard once sang, "We're not homeless, Mister, we just don't have a house."

Jim said...

Houseless: I was houseless until in the mid-twenties. We lived in appartments before that.

Houseless: Doesn't have to be homeless, I lived with friends sometimes also before I became married.

Houseless: Modern predatory mortgage lending tactics can lead one to this.
..

Anonymous said...

Great poem, Doug. I think Bierce would be honored.

javajazz said...

happy Bierceday, Ambrose...
we're all lucky that
Doug keeps you on ice,
in a moulderless manner
of speaking.

Ariel the Thief said...

houseless, n, slug

Anonymous said...

Stumped. Though with natural resources dwindling, electricity deregulated, and cords of wood increasing in price, it would behoove people who do not have fifteen children to think less-house.

My "poem envy" continues with this one.

Doug The Una said...

Jim, it took me until my late thirties to get a house. I'm still not sure it was a good idea. Now the world is too much with me.

Thanks, Weirsdo. I hope he's smiling in atheist heaven.

JJ, keeping him on ice is a great way to store brandy, too.

Ariel, envy the fortunate snail.

Cooper, I'm planning to heat my house by burning the three or four extra rooms if winter ever returns.

Anonymous said...

Though I don't live in a house, it's something I'm not residing in two at the moment but neither the coop or the townhouse are the right ones

Though I should be thinking of preserving resources I have preserved enough

I do so reach

Nessa said...

Happy Birthday, AB. You're looking a bit green.

Houseless: My house is now worth less than 4 years ago.

Anonymous said...

houseless---guess it is all in perception , a primary feature of a house is a roof-hence if one entertains the thought of the night sky and stars as the roof of our global house , are any of us really house-less........No doubt to the problem of the many homeless,a whole different state off mind.....Happy Birthday ,what is 166 years ????? peace&love

Anonymous said...

Houseless - something I could use a bit more of when it comes time for spring cleaning.

Ariel's definition makes me thing of that houseless 24-y.o. up in Gloucester, MA, who has been accused of adding babies to the houses of high school sophomore girls. May his slug hide experience less homelessness for a few years in The Big House.

Anonymous said...

think, not thing. ring-a-ding, thing.

The Old Mule said...

houseless: the lowest quarters (see Bierce, Ambrose nee "Bitter")

Anonymous said...

worst part of houseless is the toiletless aspect

tsduff said...

Ariel read my mind, as slug is the word. My Boy is full of baloney - he uses the back forty under the stars for most his call-of-nature-needs.

Houseless: A great fear I've always housed. Thinking it might be a bridge someday.

Hail JJ - well said. Ambrose affords us a great daily fun house of intellect, through our dearest friend Doug.

Anonymous said...

We have one? Cool.
--formerly houseless in afterlife

Doug The Una said...

Pia, you reach far. What more could I ask?

Even with you in it, Nessa?

Brer Bear, I think I was 30 before I'd spent more nights indoors than out. That's barely a metaphor.

Actonbell, it suffices for me. There ya go.

Saurkraut, are scandals Pennsylvania's chief export?

Anon, we edit in our minds.

Always well-dressed, Mule.

Anonymous, that's what backyards are for.

Terry, of course Ariel read your mind. It's what they do.

Weirsdo, how many NG4J alums can fit on the head of a pin? We gots room.

Nessa said...

Doug, you sweet talker.

Anonymous said...

Okay... so I know I am like so late... but... you miss me, right?

"Well, it's a stupid fight
to say it's sweet when you're dealin' with the gates of hell.
And grace is dead and God is gone if you keep sayin',
"All is well."

"Bring cleanness to our dirt floor," he told me,
"Cause I can't stand it anymore.
And the wind is howlin' so loud outside.
Would you please just go away and close that houseless door."

But He said
If you're weary and heavy laden,
If you're tired of a love that's fadin'
Well, Come to Me. "

Doug The Una said...

Nessa, I'm all tongue.

Of course, Shayna.