Blurp

A blurp is not a burp.
No.
Surely, it's much worse.
It rushes out of both ends,
Like a vacuum in reverse.
A hiccup, burp, and sneeze, and cough
Come all at once,
The bomb goes off.
Both eyes pop out,
Your head explodes,
And all your body juice unloads.

A snoff is both a cough and sneeze,
It crosses eyes and weakens knees.
A belchy hiccup's called a hurp,
It's slightly worse than any burp,
But watch out for the worst of all -
The catastrophic blurp.


-B.C. Byron
This is what happens when you burp, sneeze, cough, and pass gas all at once.
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There’s a rumor out there that your eyes will pop out of the sockets if you open your them during a sneeze. There’s another claim that your head will explode from the pressure if you hold a sneeze back completely. I’ve done both of these more than once and I still have my eyes and head in place. It wasn’t thad bad actually and not as hard to do as you’re probably thinking. But what about a hiccup, burp, cough, sneeze, and gas happening all at once? Does the pressure add together or even multiply causing the disturbing scene above? Would your pants blast open at the back and your eyeballs jump from their holes as you’re wracked with bodyquakes from head to foot? I’d really like to know, as long as I don’t have to experience it myself – just as a an observer from a safe distance.

For the sake of furthering science, I’m calling for volunteers to test the blurp theory. The experiment involves chugging soda and eating gassy foods, then corking all the pressure exit points except one nostril (so you can breathe). As a feather is applied to the one open nostril, a de-corking mechanism unblocks the orifices all at once. Easy-peasy. Our test subject will be modestly compensated, of course, and their family will receive all funds in the event that the experiment goes as expected and your head actually does explode. Imagine if you don’t die, though. You’d be sure to get a page in Ripley’s Believe It or Not and a massive number of video views on all social media apps. Fame, fortune, glory, and scientific progress – all thanks to your pioneering bravery. The first blurp in history.

If that sounds too risky, I have some other experiments you could sign up for involving microwaves and porcupines, but that’s a poem for another time.

Gimme’ Five

Gimme' five
Gimme' ten
On the side
Round the bend
Backwards five
And now, a low five
Use your foot to give a toe five
Way up here
Another HIGH five
Fingers out
Let's try an EYE five

-B.C. Byron
For some reason, the eye five has never gained the popularity of the high five
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I’ve seen some pretty elaborate high five routines, some taking several minutes to complete. High five, knuckle bump, elbow bump, face slap, finger wiggle, robot, nose pinch, high foot, all ending with “duuuuude”. Then another friend enters the room and the ritual starts over again. By round ten, the now red-knuckled, exhausted pals have forgotten why they came by in the first place. In high school, everyone group of friends seemed to have their own unique sequence and I was the only one that could never get the whole thing down. It was almost as difficult as memorizing the 30 extra lives code on Contra (an original Nintendo game). Was it a-b-a-b-up-down-a-b? You also had to get timing just right or end up rebooting the Nintendo and waiting a whole minute to try again. In the case of high five rituals, poor timing risked a poke in the eye or an awkward pause that kills the whole greeting.

For some reason, my eye five routine never really caught on with the other kids. I tried a few other fives as well – The hug five (for the girls), the throat five, the scream like you’re on fire five, take a bite of each other’s lunch five, nostril five – all complete bombs. There was apparently some unspoken set of high five rules that I wasn’t privy to.

This internet age has seen a decline in high fiving as so many social interactions are done through screens. I think we need to invent a digital equivalent of the five. You might be thinking emojis fill that role, but I would disagree. Emojis lack that hand-stinging, personal space invasion. A mere picture of fiving hands is not enough. Perhaps phone makers could install an impact detector on the screen side of your mobile to facilitate the new age high five. Users could smack the screen when a friend’s face appears and the detector triggers a success sound if the power of the hit registers as numbing-pain level. We might need to make tougher screens and bulkier phones, but somehow we’ve got to keep these important traditions alive.