April 1st, 2021
By William Kozy
Uncle Simon sometimes feels like a writing exercise to see how many creative insult monikers Serling can come up with. He’ll use “garbage head”, “wilting blossom”, “passionless vegetable”, “angular turnip”, “night-crawling imitation of the female gender”, “crooked-seamed grubber”, “scrounging female ape”, “thin-lipped toothpick-legged conniver”, “money-sick crone”, “lint-headed clod”, “torpid lotus-eater”, “bovine crab”, and “ugly harpy.” Or he’ll expand the task into creating descriptive insults: “you ancient albatross with a dirty mouth,” from her, and from him: “You’re the only woman I know who looks as if underneath her clothes, she wore clothes” (ba dump bump) or “You have all the grace and femininity of a high-button shoe” and “your spindle-shanked carcass”, and “that Raggedy Ann carcass of yours.”