The grasshopper sat atop a hill looking down on an ant village hard at work. He took a long puff from his corn kernel pipe and exhaled a smoke ring or two. The gentle wind pushed the smoke rings over the anthill below. He focused in on one ant in particular, the one toting two bread crumbs on his back, panting and heaving, and sweating in a way only an ant can.

The grasshopper was mildly nauseous watching this disgusting display of labor, and hopped over to the object of its repulsion. The toiling ant did not see the grasshopper, all he could see was a future where his family are enjoying the literal fruit of his labors.

The grasshopper spoke in an odd high pitch. “Hey man, you are so stupid. Work is for suckers.”

The ant was snapped back into the moment by the strange sound, he looked up at the grasshopper who pulled a fiddle out of his backpack, “I could say the same of you, grasshopper.” The ant sounded a lot like a very tiny Ray Romano. “Winter is rapidly approaching, and with this global warming hanging ominously over our heads, it could be sooner. Laziness is for “suckers”.” Even with the crumbs on his back, the ant managed to make air quotes.

Tucking the fiddle under its chin, the grasshopper played an out of tune melody. It sounded like a defective mp3 clicking, followed by some sort of sound, erratic clicking, some sort of sound, then silence. It was definitely annoying.

The incredulous ant asked, “Isn’t the fiddle redundant? You could easily play that same song by rubbing pegs on the inner surface of your hind femur against the edge of your forewing.”

The grasshopper shook its head, “A fiddle is never redundant. That’s the problem with you people, there is a box, and you sit there and think inside it, never questioning the stink of your own ass within that ever-increasing shrinking box. Carpe diem.”

Now, the ant was offended, antennas twitching, nostrils or whatever that thing is flaring, “I am seizing the day, while you squander the day. Effundere diem. Thank you. I work now to provide a certain future, while you… while you… I don’t even know. Gah.”

“Not so, ant, you are just providing for the man, you are a tool.”

“This isn’t always about “the man”,” the ant strained to stand up with the food still adhered to its back just to make air quotes, “Sometimes “the man” is just us.” It added another air quote, nearly dropping the crumbs.

Then there was a sudden darkness, followed by what seemed to be a log burning on one end; it was a cigarette butt. Keep in mind the perspective of an insect, a cigarette butt would be a log, and a log, a gigantic skyscraper, and a gigantic skyscraper, an endless infinity skyscraper.

During their debate, they broke the cardinal rule of survival in a man’s world, and became unaware of their surroundings.

This was followed by the descending foot of the man who stood above them, and a purposeful smoosh of cigarette butt, dry orange leaf, ant, bread crumbs, and grasshopper. The scent was undeniably death and carnage on a man on insect hate crime scale.

MORAL: All work and no play, and no work and all play don’t mean you’re not going to get killed one way or another.

#AlthoughDeadJamesBrownIsASurvivor, #JamesBrownBothAntAndGrasshopper