This puts me in mind of the old children's rhyme:

Why does the hammerhead hop and skip so slightly in the morning?
Why does the hottentot tote his goat so lightly without warning?
Why does the plasterer plaster, dear,
With hacking skills and numchucks near...
Why does the bastard belch his beer, with verve, like some Bejorning?

For years, this little piece of doggerel was thought to be nothing more than a poem wrapped in a conundrum and drizzled with raspberry vinegarette. However, research has proven otherwise. The question is, WHICH other has been proven wise? This alone has caused the great minds of science to seek shelter in Roller Derby and other more sane pursuits.

The upshot, of course, is not to cling to one's identity too tightly. Why not rather be a malingerer than a plasterer? Or a bastard than a Frenchman. I ask you.

yours,
Tottenham,
Field Marshal without a badge

DJ:

It's the follow up verse that I have always loved

Cause the head is so hopped and hammered it skips
Cause the goat tote is hotter than snot
Cause the dear is plastered early in the morning
His number one man, Charles, hacking and hacking
Belching Bjorn Borg into the Bastard's beer. 

Moby Ustrip, creator of the tape loop

BR:

You refer here to a bawdy Celtic drinking ditty that was a sad and shameful parody of the original. Many a sap has gotten soused to this one.

The "Charles" referred to here is Charles of Lushney (later, Charles the Lush,) who attempted to invade the Celts in 721 AD, using the snowshoe as a weapon. He only succeeded in inventing tennis.

Charles and his entire army were armed with snowshoes, which were part of a shipment of showshoes intended for delivery to Lapland, but which had gone awry and ended up at the doorstep of Lushney Castle. Charles, coincidentally, had been waiting for a shipment of weapons that had been promised to him, "Weapons of strange device, which no man might fathom..." as the sales brochure read. Having never seen the weapon in question (actually a crossbow,) Charles had to admit he couldn't fathom the snowshoe, and so this must be the weapon in question. So, he passed them out and off they went a-Celting.

The story goes that as the two armies clashed "early in the morning", the Celtic leader, Gwrthym the Bastard, charged forward on his snow white goat, hit a low-hanging treelimb and promptly lost his head, which "hopped" as the poem indicates, directly into the path of Charles... who swiped (or "hammered") at it with a snowshoe. The head flew, skipping, back toward the Celtic hoarde, who failed to return the volley.

The Lushes, as they were called, won the day. But Charles was so unnerved by the experience of having a human head volley at him out of nowhere, that he never quite got over it. He took to drinking. This was helped along by the fact that Gwrthym had quite a liquor cabinet. Five hundred barrells of the arrogant bastard's beer (still available and a favorite at meetings of various musical appreciation societies,) found their way into Charles' storehouses, and Charles himself was responsible for downing most of the stuff.

Constant drinking weakened the "number one man" of the Lush population, causing him to succumb to Tuberculosis... with the attendant hacking cough. So you see, the mysterious rhyme becomes clear when the facts of history are known.

No one has quite worked out what it is that Charles belched into the beer... the meaning of "Bjorn Borg" remains unknown to this day. In some parts of Lower Ruglia, the final line is rendered "Belching Borg Warner into the Bastard's Pop." But this too is difficult to clearly explain.

Of course, even today, we refer to one who drinks heavily as a "lush," in honor of Charles. To those who play tennis, we refer not at all.

Thank you for your interest in the human soul.
Moby Dork
The Great White Nerd