The Birther Olympics: Update No. 2: (Diving In Over Your Head)

Sometimes, You Just get In Over Your Head

Finally, the results are in for the latest Birther Olympics event, Diving In Over Your Head. The games were thrown into complete disarray when every Birther who came to the games registered for this event. This was foreseeable, all of them having been over their heads since day one of Birtherism.  Extra Judges were rushed in, and after a marathon day (and night) of performances, the results are in.

Darren Huff, late of Georgia,  took home the Bronze Medal for his pantomine performance, in full drag, of Don’t Take Your Guns To Town, by Johnny Cash.  Accompanied by four federal marshals, Huff sported a full beard and drop stitch stockings. Playing it completely for laughs, Huff was not expected to qualify,  much less win anything.  However, in a move reminiscent of Nadia Comaneci’s insouciant hand gestures during the 1976 Montreal Olympics, Huff added his own sassy little line immediately after the last “don’t take your guns to town”, that line being “nor your pink dildos either.”  The normally staid judges all broke out in uncontrollable laughter, and Huff was returned to Federal custody with the Bronze Medal safely sealed in a little brown personal property envelope along with the stockings.

Coming in second, and winning the Silver Medal, was CDR Walter F. Fitzpatrick III, USN Ret. Dressed in full naval regalia, he performed a surreal and haunting rendition to the tune of I Fought The Law by Bobby Fuller, accompanied only by a solo pedal harp. To my knowledge, this is the first time this song has ever been performed in this manner, much less in a minor key. When Fitzpatrick’s gravelly voice broke out with, “citizen-arrestin’ in the hot sun” followed by the plaintive refrain of “I fought the law and the law won”, as the harpist plucked out G Minor and C minor chords, a hush fell over the auditorium.  His song writing was immaculate, and lines like “grabbin’ legal papers in a fast run” and “eatin’ bad food, couldn’t see the sun” conveyed the full range of his experiences in what has come to be called the Madisonville Mutiny.

But the evening was all about the gold, and ex-Col. Terry Lakin was the big surprise of this event. Dressed in his sad clown costume, Lakin performed his Divesti la Giubba aria, borrowed from Leon Cavallo’s I, Pagliacci. Who knew he could sing??? And with his lyrics, Lakin did old Leon one better, sweeping him under the ruggero as they say in Italia. Oh, the pathos literally mounted up to the ceilings, as Lakin sang the final words:

So laugh, Terry Lakin,
Even as your heart’s breakin’,
Now Laugh, Clown Doctor, your prescription mistaken.
Ha,ha,ha,ha,ha. . .

and collapsed in a sobbing heap on the stadium floor. The crowd went crazy. Even some of the Obots had tears in their eyes. No one was expecting this level of theatrical sophistication. Yet, perhaps we should have known better. After all, the Birthers have been practicing drama and theatrics 24/7 for almost 4 years straight

Reporting from beautiful downtown Laguna Niguel, this is:

Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter

Note 1. Lakin’s Lament: Here are the complete lyrics to the Lakin’s Lament Aria.

Divesti la Giubba

Rejection! Sadly seeming nobody wants me.
Booted out of the Army,
Oh woe, woe is me,
My uniform, they took from me!
Ah! How my heart is breakin’
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha
The Clown, Terry Lakin!

Bye Bye, Doctor coat!
How’d I put my self in this boat?
Internet Birthers, believing stuff they wrote!
Berg and Apuzzo, and even Donofrio.
The Clown, Terry Lakin, took the bait. Alas, Oh Noes!!!
Now, my fate – Floppy shoes, squirting flowers, a big red nose.

Now laugh, Terry Lakin,
Even while your heart’s breakin’,
Now Laugh, Clown Doctor, your prescription mistaken.
Ha, ha,ha,ha,ha. . .

Note 2: Divesti la Giubba – this is a pigdin English-Italian word play on vesti la Giubba, the song from the opera I, Pagliacci.  Vesti la giubba means put on the costume, or put on the jacket. The English prefix “di” has been cobbled with the Italian “vesti” to make it mean divest - take off the the professional clothes as Lakin was forced to do with his uniform and his Doctor’s coat.

Here is a more detailed explanation of the actual meaning of vesti la giubba:

I admire your attempts, but Italian is a bit more complicated than you think, and less “scientific” than German and germanic languages, in general. To this you should add the difficulty that the text in an operatic libretto uses a poetic style in the lyrics that makes it even harder to a foreigner to find out the right translation key.

So, I’m pleased to solve your puzzle by a little pill of Italian grammar and lexicon. Let’s examine the sentence: “Vesti la giubba”.

Here “Vesti” is the imperative mood, present tense, second person singular of verb “vestire”, in the sense of “indossare”, which corresponds to the English imperative “put on (+ noun)”, “dress yourself with (+noun)”.

Unfortunately, and that causes part of the puzzle, “vesti” is indeed also the plural of “veste”, which is a poetic word for “vestito”, which corresponds to the English noun “dress” (hence, in the plural, also to “clothes”), in the general meaning of “whatever you put on your body to prevent its being naked”.

Let’s go on. ”la giubba” is the object complement (i.e. an accusative noun) of “vesti”, and simply means “the costume”, “the jacket”. Therefore “la” is the definite article, feminine singular (the neutral gender, although existing in Latin, has disappeared in Italian) and “giubba” is the noun of the thing that Canio has to put on to get ready for the scene.

http://cvpug.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-2252.html

Note 3: Vesti la giubba: For those unfamiliar with either the opera or the aria, here is a youtube video. I am surprised this version has not had more hits:

Note 4. The Image. I can’t figure out who the artist is, but it can be found here:

http://www.bridgemanart.com/search?filter_text=deep+sea+diver&x=14&y=17

Note 5. Miscellaneous.

When Birther Darren Huff was arrested, the cops actually found a gun, tranny porn,  and a pink dildo in his vehicle.

One of Walter Fitzpatrick’s biggest supporters is Sharon Rondeau of The Post and EMail. Ms. Rondeau is a professional harpist.

Leon Cavallo was a close friend of Michael Angelo.

Lakin’s Lament aria is actually singable to the Vesti la giubba music.

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