Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has a problem. It is a problem of association. This is not to say that he has a problem with his associates. He doesn’t. He has a problem with mental associations.

Perhaps some background is in order…

As readers know, your Maximum Leader is the father of three wonderful kids. He is a pretty good father, as best he can tell. And it seems like his kids are turning out okay.

The eldest of his three children, Villainette #1, is an avid reader. You can give her a stack of books and a quiet place and she will just read and read. It is good to see. (She will, alas, also spend hours and hours in front of the TV if given the opportunity. Which she is not given often…) Recently she’s been moving up to young adult novels recommended (eg: vetted) by her mother, a teacher.

She recently finished a book about a young girl who moves into the “wild west” with her family in the 1880s. Your Maximum Leader does not know the details of the plot of this book, or even its title. But he now knows something that was said in the book. It seems as though one of the boys in this story is something of a cowboy. When this boy does something exciting or daring he was prone to yell out “Yippie ki yay!” Well… Villainette #1 thought this phrase was pretty cool. So she’s been repeating it.

Last weekend, before heading off to the beach, the whole family went to a pool party. Villainette #1 would run and jump into the pool yelling out “Yippie ki yay!” Now… Your Maximum Leader, like so many others his age, ran out in the summer of 1988 and saw Die Hard when it came out in the theatres. Do you see where this is going? Every time his lovely 10 years old Villainette ran and jumped into the pool yelling “Yippie ki yay” your Maximum Leader expected the next word out of her sweet little mouth to be “motherfucker.”

Your Maximum Leader hates to admit it; but frankly in his mind there is a permanent association between the words “yippie ki yay” and “motherfucker.” Depending on his mood he hears this phrase spoken by both Bruce Willis and Alan Rickman. When your Maximum Leader is feeling particularly evil it is the Alan Rickman delivery. Now, unfortunately, when he hears his beautiful and intelligent daughter yelling out the first part of the phrase he now imagines her yelling out the second part as well. It is quite distressing.

He’s tried to get the sound of his mind. He’s tried thinking of Tom Mix, Roy Rogers, the Lone Ranger, Marshall Matt Dillon, and Ben Cartwright. Any of those men would have said the first words, without the second. He tried singing “Coyotes” in his mind to put the offending word out of his mind. Alas… No good…

After the family returned from the pool party, and the kids had been put to bed; your Maximum Leader mentioned this problem to the lovely Mrs. Villain. She informed your Maximum Leader that he would just have to get over it and put it out of his mind. That was a movie, and this is his daughter… Well… Mrs. Villain called your Maximum Leader to fill him in on the plans for her (and the kids’) return. She also admitted that all week when Villainette #1 was jumping into the pool and crying out the words “Yippie ki yay” she heard the follow-on in her mind…

Lucky for both of us the summer is almost over and the opportunity for Villainette #1 to use the phrase appears to be gowing short.

Carry on.