"Do you know that mild-mannered
Marty Kugler has 1200 onions planted?" Ivan asked. "That's twelve hundred Onions. He will have enough onions to give bad breath to every man, woman, and child in Smith County. So with an epidemic of bad breath, that will mean a drop in intimacy, resulting in a lower birth rate. Eventually that will mean a drop in the student count, resulting in Smith Center dropping from a 2A to a 1A high school. You wouldn't think that raising twelve hundred onions would have such a far-reaching effect. But there it is in black and white. And, in case you didn't know it, Marty also becomes the zucinni phantom in July and August. If you get the front seat of your car loaded down with zucinni, you will know the zucinni phantom has struck again."
"From the Echo comes this non-binding proclamation," Ivan proclaimed. "Be it know that as non-binding proclamations go, this is the most binding of the non-binding. So let it be know that two wit - three wit even - that henceforth or hencefifth even, that beginning with the Sunday after Easter running until the Sunday after Labor Day, there will be no, none, neckties worn in churches. Due to global warming and the stuffy summer-time sermons, no neckties will be required. This no necktie regulation is in effect from the Sunday after Easter til the Sunday after Labor Day for main-line churches only. The ultra-fundamental groups will play by different rules. If you are an ult-fund, your no tie days will run from the first Sunday after Memorial Day until the Sunday before Labor Day. The Echo editor has spoken."
"Seems to me," Ivan said, "that all the highly successful people I know had LaVern Meyer for their first and second grade teacher. I had Geraldine Wagner for my first grade teacher. She was all right. Then I had Della Flakenberg for my second grade teacher. She didn't like me and she was mean to me."
"Well, boys," Ivan said, "I started exercising on March 1st. I have religiously exercised daily since that date. So far I have not lost one pound, nor one inch off my belly. Joe Lambert told me one time that a doctor told him that it didn't make no difference how much weight he lost, he was still going to have a big belly. I suppose that is going to be my destiny too. If it is, I might as well quit kidding myself and go back to the ol' recliner."
"Sometimes," Ivan said, "your age just jumps and bites you. The other morning at the Numerical Cafe I mentioned the Hossier Hotshots. I was the only one in there that had ever heard of them. They were a foursome that played music on a washboard, tin whistle, and a real instrument. Of course I was the only one that knew their names. There were Hezzie, Kenny, Gil, and Gabe. They would start each song by saying, 'Are you ready, Hezzie?' That became an expression we all used. When we were going to do something, one of us would say, 'Are you ready, Hezzie?'"
"I walked out in a snow storm last Friday long about six fifteen in the morning," Ivan said. "It was snowin' but the birds were singing like it was Spring. I wondered what they knew that I didn't."
Hmm. And the legend has it that when Satan was expelled from heaven, he strode around the world in a fit. Where his left foot (hoof) landed, onions sprang up; from his right, garlic.
I can't get it out of my mind that these are in fact gifts.
At the expense of intimacy...?
Posted by: poor_mad_peter | April 24, 2007 at 02:28 PM