Overheard on the corner of Pismo and Stream

Random Flickr Blogging rides again. Brought to you by the number 4580. Photo pinched from Justabird2’s photostream.

Meet Calum and Edgar:

Calum: Would you look at that.

Edgar: Shameless, it is. Yet perfectly legal.

Calum: Plucked clean as the day she was born.

Edgar: Cleaner. It’s a, what do you call it. The latest thing. A Brazilian, ain’t it?

Calum: Why would a chick do something like that?

Edgar: Dunno. Maybe her bloke got tired of gettin’ feathers up his bill.

Calum: Now that just ain’t right. Why, it’s a veritable sewer down there!

Edgar: Speak for yourself, Calum. I keep my nethers clean with a nice gingerly salt water bath, three times a day. Never know when a lass might fancy a poke.

Calum: Ain’t right at all. Kids these days. In my time, a bloke counted himself lucky if he got a bit o’ flutter three times a week. Now it’s all beak-piercings and oral sex, and if a cock ain’t willing to put his beak where the sun don’t shine, a chick’ll tell him to take a long walk down a short pier.

Edgar: So that’s how it’s going with you and the missus, then?

Calum: I ain’t said nothing about the missus.

Edgar: Oh, you was talking all hypothetical-like.

Calum: Precisely.

Edgar: But I heard through the grapevine you two had quite a row.

Calum: Don’t believe everything —

Edgar: Heard your Henrietta went back to the nest and pecked open every last egg. Pure spite, it was.

Calum (sobs)

Edgar: And actionable, too.

Calum: Ah, but I love her, the old hen.

Edgar: Even though she pilfers all your sand crabs? And when the smelt ran last year? She was all over ’em like Jonathan Livingston on French fries.

Calum: She has stresses.

Edgar: In her knees, maybe. She must weigh as much as a penguin.

Calum: Now you’re just being hurtful.

Edgar: Trying to make you see the light. Look here, Calum. You might be old and grey but you still got all your feathers and your legs are good and straight. You can fly with the best of them, and I’ll wager the old John Thomas still has a field or two left to plough. Am I not right?

Calum: Talk like that makes me uncomfortable. It’s not right for a cock to be referencing my John Thomas.

Edgar: Oi. I’ll tell you a secret.

Calum: What is it?

Edgar: Come a bit closer. I don’t want those pelicans to hear or they’ll blab it from Santa Barbara to Mendocino.

Calum: All right, all right. Out with it.

Edgar: My birth name was Edwina.

Calum: Edwina? Well that’s a daft name for a cock.

Edgar: Edwina, Calum. Think about it.

Calum: You’re . . . ?

Edgar (nods)

Calum: But, but, how is that possible?

Edgar: Internal genitalia, old friend, and our singular lack of secondary sex characteristics. I act like a cock and no one asks questions.

Calum: But . . . but I’ve seen you and Melissa . . .

Edgar: Missy? She’s a love. She’s in on it. Pretends like I’m giving it to her good, she does, and that keeps all the other blokes away.

Calum: Then what’s in it for her?

Edgar: Missy’s shacked up with Elizabeth. They’ve been life partners for years now. But until society is ready to accept us, we’ll go right on pretending, Missy and I.

Calum: Well, then, I understand Missy, but I don’t understand you. You, um, like hens, too?

Edgar: Me? Hell no. I like cocks. Big, manly cocks.

Calum: Then why all the mystery?

Edgar: I’m a career girl, old friend. Couldn’t exactly police the shoreline if I had to tend to a fat load of eggs, now could I? And besides all that, I never met the right cock.

Calum: Ah, Edgar. Edwina. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to look at you the same way again.

Edgar: I’m not sure I want you to look at me the same way, Calum. The way I figure it, with you and Henrietta, the line’s been drawn in the sand and she crossed it long ago. I’ve been waiting for you, love.

Calum (gulps)

Edgar: Now, how about a bit of the ol’ flutter, mate?

D.