Phum Trapeang Chum

I have been walking around all day wondering what exactly "tongue chum" is. And I was wondering if anyone had ever used the phrase "tongue chum" when they were speaking with me. I can imagine a peculiar bully in grade school informing me in a loud voice that he was going to turn me into tongue chum if I didn't hand over my lunch money instantly. I can imagine it. I just can't remember it.

I don't want to think that my brain is just throwing random words together just for the hell of it or because it doesn't know any better. I want my brain to make nice with the rest of the world and use words in a socially acceptable way. I have been calling my cats "butter monkeys" for years and when you tell a friend that the butter monkeys are in the kitchen eating tongue chum you will get a strange look.

This is clearly a slippery slope when words that don't belong together start spending all their free time slow dancing with each other. After a while you start thinking you'll never open your spit hanger again...

But whenever I think I might be crazy I just fire up the old internet, drag out my favorite search engine and do a search. When you do a search for "tongue chum" on Google any thought you might have that you are crazy just goes up in smoke. Tongue and chum are kissing cousins on the internet. Google proudly presents 72 results for that particular search. Granted "tongue chum" is no Brittany Spears. But give Tongue Chum implants, and insane sense of rhythm and the voice of an angel and see what happens.

These are four of my favorite results.

There is a band named Chum that has a website and on that website is a picture of Bob the lead guitarist. The caption to the photo is "Bob shows some Tongue." Let me just say Bob is no Gene Simmons...

There is an unnamed MTV movie that has a character named Joe whose boyhood Chum is called sharp Tongue.

There is a Salmon called a Chum salmon that has no teeth at the base of it Tongue. (Who knew fish had tongues?)

This is my favorite. There is a village in Cambodia called phum trapeang Chum where a cow is known to cure it's owner by licking it with it's Tongue.

Thank God I'm not crazy although I am a little afraid to Google "Butter Monkey". I mean what if a Butter Monkey is another name for the Devil. Knowing my cats that would just make too much sense....