(Speaking) of Michelangelo...

"howdy, everybody!" gavin cardigan hollered out as he entered the Pub.

"howdy, gavin," danny blake replied, pouring him a Bass Ale. "i've got some tex-mex cheese enchiladas with chili gravy. interested?"

"you have to ask? i thought you were smarter than that," cardigan took a swallow, then walked over to join his friends.

sierra charles pointed her fork at the plate of half-eaten enchiladas in front of her. "these are amazing."

marian elfman, the notorious cheese ho', nodded in agreement as she chewed with a smile on her face. cardigan wondered briefly how she was able to do that.

linda nulo looked up from her notebook. "burkie's from texas. he knows what good enchiladas are." she looked over at taylor young, her jaw tightening. "you're going down, vampire!"

taylor bared his fangs in her general direction. "i do my talking on the field, where i'm 2-0. what's your record again? oh, yeah. 1-1."

just then, an exuberant young man--well, no longer young, really...definitely on the back side of 30--with bright red hair came bouncing into the Pub. "h.t.s.e.b.d. everybody!"

marian made a face that looked kinda like this o.O as he approached the table. "i guess i'm early," he noted, looking around as if he expected to see more people.

"early for what?" Mysterious Lurker asked, her steely eyes glinting dangerously. "and who are you? and what does...whatever you said...mean?"

"why, Happy T.S. Eliot's BirthDay, of course!" he looked around, his smile refusing to give in to the disinterest dominating the room. "aren't you guys celebrating? i'm sean IX, by the way."

"sean icks?"

"not icks. those are roman numerals. i'm sean the ninth," he explained, as if that made perfect sense.

"the ninth what?"

"the ninth wonder of the modern world," he quipped, with a wink. "but you can call me sean."

"i prefer icks," cardigan muttered under his breath.

"why would you think we'd be celebrating t.s. eliot's birthday?" sierra asked.

"why, he's the coolest poet of all time," sean IX answered in a tone of conviction that this could not be disputed.

"i don't know about that," danny stated flatly as he delivered a plate of enchiladas to gavin.

"enchiladas?" sean IX shook his head. "that's not appropriate for eliot. he was american before he was british, but he wasn't a texan. how 'bout some bangers 'n mash?"

"no."

"eliot wasn't anywhere near as cool as poe," the Lurker noted, her raven hair falling across half her face. "poe died of mysterious causes. how did eliot die?"

"emphysema," sean IX expained, "but--"

"or sylvia plath!" marian noted gleefully. "she stuck her head in an oven!"

"i like coleridge," added taylor. "especially cristabel. did eliot ever write about vampires?"

"no, but--"

"hondo crouch wrote poems about luckenbach," linda pointed out. "you can't get cooler than that. plus, his name was hondo. and crouch."

"well, yes, but--"

"i like burkie's poetry," sierra broke in. "he won an award, you know. wait..." she shook her head violently. "i don't know why i said that."

cardigan rolled his eyes. "gee, i can't imagine why you'd say that."

"but eliot won the--"

"i like cliff lynn. he's a modern poet," cardigan continued, ignoring the indefatigable eliot fanatic. "he's won an award, too."

a neat, balding man with a little beard came forward to collect their plates. "dr. seuss is the coolest poet of any age," he declared, um, declaratively.

"except for yourself, shakespeare," cardigan slapped him on the back. "you da man!"

"and this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and coolness in everything," shakespeare replied, bringing the debate to an end.