Maurice & Friends

This season, so far, is marked with manic socializing by numerous animals minus a few designated bad asses. As much as I hate to admit such, my dear friend Betty Chimpo is a selected B.A. and has been thoroughly ignored by some who would have otherwise included her on their invitation lists of holiday functions. Only the very caring and kind Sylvia and Bernard Cougar included her at one of their Christmas functions. Bertram, Lachlan, Gloria and I took her to dinner one night. She continued to fiddle with her cell phone, apparently eager for a call from her fellow bad ass, Sean Simba. Lachlan and I have been inundated by invites this season. We are running in such crazy Noel-saturated circles, we tend to become dizzy. I, for one, cannot wait for the season to end.

Lachlan and me in front of our Mombasa Christmas tree....

Lachlan tells me, as we mosey about the mall almost daily, that I am becoming senile. Of course, he says it in a tender, teasing and caring way. This idea is brought on by my constant statements regarding the young in the Mara, among our friends, growing and maturing so rapidly. The other afternoon, we ran into Cynthia Cheetah with her granddaughter, young Cindy Simba, Sloane and Caroline’s offspring. She is still a small thing but I had to blink twice. It was almost as if young Cindy was growing ample boobs before my very eyes. When grandmother and granddaughter were out of hearing range, I put this thought forth to Lachlan who stopped in his tracks laughing.

“Maurice, dear God, that little Cindy is still a small cub and flat as an ironing board,” he guffawed. “However, being an ape, you still haven’t gotten a bead on how fast some other mammals reach puberty. It’s almost overnight. Look at Sean Simba, that cute little motherless cub that Betty took under her wing. Now he’s fucking her.”

Lachlan continued his spell of mirth as I joined in the mood. We finally had to tamp down our high humor with Irish coffee at Margaux’s.

Count on magnate Lewis Lyon and his dear friend, President Shane Simba, to work in tandem on a project of great interest to Kenya. Shane, working with Parliament, has refurbished the funding for Kenya University in Nairobi and called for patrons to contribute to the project. Lewis Lyon, always a civic minded and philanthropic soul, immediately answered the call. The construction multi-billionaire went further toward bettering education in Kenya. He contributed a huge amount of money toward enhancing the campus in the capital city and erecting a new one in the Masai Mara to be named for his father, former President Ralph Lyon. There are at present several unspectacular buildings already existing that are a branch of Kenya U. New departments will be added to the school. Now, with this project and massive donations, fresh energy will be pumped into our academia.

Betty sat in a glum mood in her bedroom with a bright fire laid by Babs. She had received phone calls from Arlon, Joshua and her sister, Gloria Chimpo Baboon asking her to dinner at her house. She felt like none of this, zilch, she was in the dumps. Wilda Wildebeest was having dinner with her sons. Babs was with her family. Betty received a call from Bob Bushbuck, her friend and of times employer.

“Betts,” chortled Bob. “The academic dean at Kenya University called me this evening. They will have a journalism department in Lewis Lyon’s new campus in the Mara. They wanted me to recommend a professor for this subject…actually they asked my advice on someone to head the department. Guess who I came up with?”

“Who?”

“Who else but the diva of journalism – you,” he told her.

“Oh, Bob, I am so persona-non-grata at the moment. I can only imagine parents picketing the campus if they heard I was to be there,” she said.

“Not with me, Betts. Never with me, you’re a genius in the field of journalism. In addition, remember, these are university kids, all above legal age. Will you take the post? Janie recommended you too.”

“I would love to do something like that, Bob. It would be marvelous,” she answered with the first lilt in her voice since Manhattan.

“Almost a done deed, Betts - I will get back to you after Christmas as will the dean.”

Betty hung up the phone and ran to the deserted kitchen. She poured a brandy. She couldn’t wait to tell Wilda and Babs of her landfall.

A fire blazed in Betty’s main living room. She had showered and was dressed in cashmere slacks and sweater when Wilda Wildebeest arrived from a visit with her sons and grandchildren. Wilda put down her things and lit a cigarette.

“Well I must say you are looking as bright and bushytailed as a lemur on crack. What gives, Betts?”

Betty, stumbling over whole sentences in her excitement, told her dear friend of Bob Bushbuck’s call and the university offer.

“Well, I’ll be damned, Betts. What did I tell you? You always end up on your feet even though you’ve fallen off a cliff in the Great Rift. You do it every time. Now for some assistance from Aunt Wilda,” teased her friend. “We are going to RUNNERS and Gerald Giraffe to get toned as fit as prize fiddles. I will be in charge. I’ve needed a bit of help myself. First, I brought some cognac, a Christmas gift from my son, Walter. He knows what a sot his mommy is. We’ll drink the whole damn thing to celebrate.”

Sean Simba locks horns with dad over higher education....

“What happened to higher education at Kenya University, Sean? There’ll be a brand new campus soon and you will have an off season to boot. Are you planning to build your entire life around balls? - pardon my badly placed pun,” said Shane Simba to his son, Sean.

“I dropped my classes there, Dad. I have two lucrative sports contracts going on. I don’t need anymore schooling,” replied his son in the casual haughtiness of the young and well placed.

Shane was seething inwardly but this was the Christmas season and he had promised Alexandra he would chill out where his eldest son was concerned.

“Ball players have a short career life, Sean. It ages you with injuries and the stress of competition. It would serve you well not to be an ignoramus once your glory days are over.”

“I can pick up all sorts of brand names and represent them. I’ve got it knocked,” stated Sean, taking a swallow of his beer.

Alexandra saw the snarl form on her husband’s lips and made to cut it short.

“Luv, join our discussion, we need your input on the matter,” said Alexandra Simba, taking her husband’s arm. “Staci and Ash are trying to decide on the best date for the baptismal and reception for the cubs.”

Sean Simba drove away from the mansion in total vexation. He could sense his father’s thinly veiled disdain, his stepmother’s efforts to hold back the beast in Shane Simba, Jalil and Tarek’s adoration of their sports hero brother, and Staci and Ashley’s attempts to deflect conversation at the table from Sean to their new cubs. He also took note of his brother, Solly’s quiet, very well contained hostility toward him. He didn’t have to think twice about where that came from.

He pulled up to his rented home on Leoparde Drive and noticed the place was lit up. He hoped a party was the reason for the drumming sounds out back. Sean cut the engine and entered the house. He made his way through the drunken, noisy crush of bodies and found a small hip hop band holding forth in the walled garden. There stood his cousin, Troy Simba, his arm around Sandi Sandcat and swaying on his feet. Sean reached in the cooler and grabbed a beer before approaching a lovely feline figure and giving her a hearty grope. This was the good life, he thought as the sexy female cat washed his tonsils with a deep kiss.

Bertram Baboon tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable and achieve a measure of sleep in his home next door to the house Sean and Troy Simba were renting. Hip Hop lyrics and loud rhythms could be heard from that premise. The once sedate home built by the late Lawrence Leoparde, had become a brothel thought the irate Bertram. Finally, unable to cease the rancor from invading his ears, even with the help of earplugs, he picked up the phone and dialed 911.

The doorbell couldn’t be heard above the din on Leoparde Drive, so police chief Bubba Simba banged as hard as he could without breaking his new hand. A smashed Imani Lyon heard the noise first and drunkenly made her way to the door.

“Yeah?” she asked in her inimitable surly manner.

“I've had a complaint from a neighbor about the noise. What the fuck is going on in this damn place?” asked Bubba, pushing his great form past Imani.

As Bubba made his way to the source of the noise, there was a sudden quiet as loud as thunder. Several voices piped up, “Uncle Bubba!”

The offending crowd was loaded with Bubba Simba’s nieces and nephews. He would have liked to have busted them then and there and call for a paddy wagon but that would have entailed too much paper work and it was late. Moreover, they were on private property and not out and about.

“There’s a noise ordinance and if you disobey it one more time, I will haul you in – every freaking one of you,” he stated.

Bubba Simba answers the call.....

The quiet lasted long enough for the police cruiser to clear Leoparde Drive and make its way back to the main road. Then it commenced once more. Bertram Baboon, having fallen into a gentle snore during the respite, was wrenched once more from the arms of Morpheus, the Greek god of sleep. He groaned and covered his head with a pillow. Lot of good it did to call the law considering the law was blood kin to all those damn Simba kids.

Wilda Wildebeest works out under Gerald Giraffe's tutelege...

Gerald Giraffe chewed on his usual straw as he oversaw his latest clients on treadmills. Wilda Wildebeest was on one with Betty Chimpo speeding up on the other.

“Move your ass, Willie,” hustled Gerald, who was a long time friend of the wildebeest reporter.

“Look, Gerald, I am a neophyte. Give me a break, will you?”

Gerald craned his head and looked directly at Wilda.

“Pretend it’s the old days and a lion is after you, Willie, that should get your engines roaring,” he chortled.

“In my wildest dreams, Gerry,” she snorted.

Gerald then turned to Betty, his expression wry, “Great, you’re at jogging speed. I won’t threaten you with a lion. You’ll probably just lie down and spread your legs.”

“GERALD! That’s uncalled for,” chided Wilda.

The headline in the Masai Mara Daily read: BETTY CHIMPO TO HEAD THE SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM AT NEW MARA CAMPUS. The arrangements had been made and the contract signed. One of the older buildings would house Betty’s department at Kenya University until the new campus was completed. It had been arranged with the academic dean that Betty would not only head the department but teach several courses including creative writing. Meanwhile, she was writing away on her new book Cougars: not necessarily feline. Her publisher was excited at the prospect of another best seller.

Betty Chimpo to head department of journalism at the new campus of Kenya University...

Sean Simba entered Jackal-Cougar Realty and took a seat, waiting for an agent. He had phoned ahead for an appointment. He was fed up with living on Leoparde Drive. That old fart, Bertram Baboon, had called the cops on their party that night and there were plenty more old fogeys that could do the same on that street. He wanted new digs where he could party his ass off in relative peace. He was thumbing through a Sports Illustrated when the agent came out of her office. He drew in his breath for the vision of loveliness that approached him. He stood hastily, dropping the magazine.

“Mr. Simba,” she said, extending a lovely hand. “I’m Angelina Cougar. I will be your agent. Let’s go in my office and see what we can do to find you a more private home.”

Sean followed, making an effort to keep his tongue from hanging out.

Angelina Cougar, new agent at Jackal-Cougar Realty. Angie has a cougar-leopard dad and a margay mom...