The Daily News
1 It's FRIDEEEEEEE!!!!!!!
2 I won't bore you with my week, because it got pulled out from under me, but I landed on pointe.
3 Like that? "On pointe?"
4
5 Didn't think so.
6 It is difficult to write when my writing style is somewhere between John Madden (Raiders' coach, who once wrote an epic called Hey Wait a Minute, (I Wrote a Book)) and Triple H who, as far as I know, never wrote anything.
7 As anyone can see, my style isn't exactly Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day? (Sonnet 18).
8 Much of what I know about writing I learned from Steinbeck, Vonnegut, Stephen King and Salinger. I like the spirit of Maya Angelou, but wouldn't even attempt to approach her talent and wonder. But those other fellows? Sure, and here's why:
9 Steinbeck probably for Travels With Charlie. Vonnegut because he admitted he was full of bullshit. And Stephen King because he is Stephen King.
10 I donned my rough-around-the edges schtick when I first ran through the fields of The Catcher in the Rye. I couldn't write if you put a gun to my head before I stumbled into the fierce world of Holden Caulfied. I have re-read that book numerous times and I still find lines that cause hot soup to fly through my nose.
11 Are you impressed I knew Shall I Compare Thee... was Shakespeare's Sonnet 18?
12 Yeah me neither.
13 Moving On, Part One: Yesterday I found this dusty old paperback called The American Way of Humor on one of my bookshelves. It was yellow, dusty and dog-eared, and was clearly divided into two parts and held together with age-old masking tape.
14 There were three separate stamps on the sides and inside cover of the book. Each said DISCARD.
15 I don't remember where I got the book but at the time I saw no reason not to swipe it.
16 I also felt I had gallantly plucked it from the school furnace.
17 For the record, it was compiled by a couple named Helen S. Weiss and M. Jerry Weiss.
18 Those Weiss's.
19 Copyright 1977, Bantam.
20 Not a proper citation, but I've spoken.
21 I heard the Weiss's passed away within a minute of each other.
22 Anybody lookin'?
23 Nah.
24 That last bit wasn't true.
25 Never mind all that.
26 Don't pay me no nevermind.
27 Anyway, the book had a lot of stuff that was somewhat obsolete, but there were a few gems in the compilation.
28 For example, it contained Jean Shepherd's classic Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories, a hysterical short of a shy guy boasting to his friends that he might just ask the hottest girl is school to the Junior Prom.
29 For the record, Shepherd was the writer who inspired A Christmas Story, and later television's now wonderfully undiscovered The Wonder Years.
30 He arrives home and announces his plans to go the prom. When his mother asks if he will be taking that nice Wanda Hickey, he balks. Here's the passage:
"Nah, I haven't decided who I'm going to take. I was kinda thinking of taking Daphne Bigelow."
His "old man" sets his bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon down on the table. He knows this could only become a train wreck for his son. Here's more from the story:
Daphne Bigelow was the daughter of one of the larger men in town. There was, in fact, a street named after her family.
"You're a real glutton for punishment, ain't you?" He fudges through the conversation and decides to make plans to go anyway, keeping the concept of Daphne as alive as possible.
"Nah, I haven't decided who I'm going to take. I was kinda thinking of taking Daphne Bigelow."
His "old man" sets his bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon down on the table. He knows this could only become a train wreck for his son. Here's more from the story:
Daphne Bigelow was the daughter of one of the larger men in town. There was, in fact, a street named after her family.
"You're a real glutton for punishment, ain't you?" He fudges through the conversation and decides to make plans to go anyway, keeping the concept of Daphne as alive as possible.
31 The nervousness of going to a New York tailor shop to the angst of how to plan the perfect date played well with any guy who ever had to go through all that. He simonized the car, somehow survived getting a tailored suit, and even spent an extra eight bucks on an corsage. He then realizes slowly that he would never be able to work up the courage to ask Daphne to the prom. Here is how he winds up asking the loyal Wanda Hickey to the prom. <WARNING: This is a long excerpt from the story, but I thought you might enjoy the flavor of Shepherd's writing. Enjoy!> As you read, the teacher in my wants you to pay attention to Shepherd's brilliant use of details, especially when the protagonist is lost in thought. Great writing tool anyone can hone. Here go. Get a helmet, but enjoy the ride!
*********************
A few hours later, after supper, I went out gloomily to water the lawn, a job that purportedly went toward earning my allowance, which had reached an all-time high that spring og three dollars a week. Fireflies played about the cottonwoods in the hazy twilight, but I was troubled. One week to go; less, now, because you couldn't count the day of the prom itself. In the drawer where I kept my socks and scout knife, buried deep in the back, were twenty-four one-dollar bills, which I had saved for the prom. Just as deep in my cowardly soul, I knew I could never ask Daphne Bigelow to be my date.
Refusing to admit it myself, I whistled moodily as I sprayed the irises and watched a couple of low-flying bats as they skimmed over the lawn and up into the poplars...my kid brother came out onto the porch and, from sheer habit, I quickly shot a stream of water over him, catching him in mid-air as he leaped high to avoid the stream. It was a superbly executed shot. I had led him just right. He caught it full in the chest, his yellow polo shirt clinging to his ribs wetly, like a second skin. Bawling at the top of his lungs, he disappeared into the house and slammed the screen door behind him. Ordinarily, this small triumph would have cheered me up for hours; but tonight, I tasted nothing but ashes. Suddenly, his face appeared in the doorway.
"I'M GONNA TELL MA!" he yelled.
Instantly, like a cobra, I struck. Sweeping the stream quickly over the screen door, I got him again. Another scream of rage and he was gone. Again, I sank into the moody sea of depression. Was I going to boot the prom?
...A feeling of helpless rage settled over me as I continued spraying he lawn. I flushed out a poor, hapless caterpillar from under a bush, squirting him mercilessly full blast, until he washed down the sidewalk and disappeared into the weeds. I felt a twinge of evil satisfaction as he rolled over and over helplessly. It was getting dark. All that was left of the sun was a long, purple-orange streak along the western horizon. I had worked my way down to the edge of our weed, pock-marked bed of sod when, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something white approaching out of the gloom. I sprinkled on, not knowing that another piece was fitted into the intricate mosaic of adolescence. I kicked absent-mindedly at a passing toad as I soaked down the dandelions.
"What are you doing?"
So deeply was I involved in self-pity that at first my mind wouldn't focus. Startled, I swung my hose around, spraying the white figure on the sidewalk ten feet away.
"I'm sorry!" I blurted out, seeing at once that I had washed down a girl in white tennis clothes.
"Oh, hi Wanda. I didn't see you there."
She dried herself with a Kleenex.
"What are you doing?" she asked again.
"I'm sprinkling the lawn" The toad hopped past, going the other way now. I squirted him briefly, out of general principles.
"You've been playing tennis?" Since she was wearing tennis clothes and carrying a racked, it seemed like the right thing to say.
"Me and Ellen Akers were playing,down at the park," she answered.
Ellen Akers was a sharp-faced, bespectacled girl I had, inexplicably, been briefly in love with in the third grade. I had come to my senses by the time we got into 4B. It was a narrow escape. By then, I had begun to dimly perceive that there was more to women than being able to play a good game of Run, Sheep, Run.
"I'm sure glad school's almost over," she went on, when I couldn't think of anything to say. "I can hardly wait. I never thought I'd be a senior."
"Yeah," I said.
"I'm going to camp this summer. Are you?"
"Yeah," I lied. I had a job already lined up for the summer, working for a surveyor. The next camp I would see would be in the Ozarks, and I'd be carrying an M-1.
Wanda swung her tennis racket at a June bug that flapped by barely at stall speed. She missed. The bug soared angrily up and whirred off into the darkness.
"Are you going to college when you graduate next year?" she asked. For some reason, I didn't like the drift of the conversation.
"Yeah, I guess so, if I don't get drafted."
"My brother's in the Army. He's in the Artillery." Her brother, Bud Hickey, was a tall, laconic type four or five years older than both of us.
"Yeah, I heard. Does he like it?"
"Well, he doesn't write much," she said. "But he's gonna get a pass next September, before he goes overseas."
"How come he's in the Artillery?" I asked.
"I don't know. They just put him there. I guess because he's tall."
"What's that got to do with it? Do they have to throw the shells or something?"
"I don't know. They just did it."
Then it happened. Without thinking, without even a shadow of a suspicion of planning, I heard myself asking: "You going to the prom?"
For a long instant she said nothing, just swn her tennis racket at the air.
"I guess so," she finally answered, weakly.
"It's gonna be great," I said, trying to change the subject.
"Uh...who you going with?" She said it as if she really didn't care one way or the other.
"Well, I haven't exactly made up my mind yet." I bend down unconcernedly and pulled a giant milkweed out by the roots.
"Neither have I," she said.
It was then I realized there was no sense fighting it. Some guys are born to dance foever with the Daphne Bigelows on shining ballroom floors under endless starry skies. Others--well, they do the best they can. I didn't know that yet, but I was beginning to suspect something.
"Wanda?"
"Yes?"
"Wanda. Would you...well...I mean...would you, you see, I was thinking..."
"Yes?"
Here I go, in over the horns: "Wanda, uh...how about...going to the prom with me?"
She stopped twitching her tennis racket. The crickets cheeped, the spring air was filled with the sound of singing froglets. A soft breeze carried with it the promise of a rich summer and the vibrant aromas of a nearby refinery.
She began softly, "Of course, I've had a lot of invitations, but I didn't say yes to any of them yet. I guess it would be fun to go with you," she ended gamely.
"Yea, well, naturally, I've had four of five girls who wanted to go with me, but I figured that they were mostly jerks anyway, and...ah...I meant to ask you all along."
The die was cast. There was no turning back. It was an ironclad rule. Once a girl was asked to the prom, only a total crumb would ever consider ducking out of it. There had been one or two cases in the past, but the perpetrators had become social pariahs, driven from the tribe to fend for themselves in the unfriendly woods.
*********************
A few hours later, after supper, I went out gloomily to water the lawn, a job that purportedly went toward earning my allowance, which had reached an all-time high that spring og three dollars a week. Fireflies played about the cottonwoods in the hazy twilight, but I was troubled. One week to go; less, now, because you couldn't count the day of the prom itself. In the drawer where I kept my socks and scout knife, buried deep in the back, were twenty-four one-dollar bills, which I had saved for the prom. Just as deep in my cowardly soul, I knew I could never ask Daphne Bigelow to be my date.
Refusing to admit it myself, I whistled moodily as I sprayed the irises and watched a couple of low-flying bats as they skimmed over the lawn and up into the poplars...my kid brother came out onto the porch and, from sheer habit, I quickly shot a stream of water over him, catching him in mid-air as he leaped high to avoid the stream. It was a superbly executed shot. I had led him just right. He caught it full in the chest, his yellow polo shirt clinging to his ribs wetly, like a second skin. Bawling at the top of his lungs, he disappeared into the house and slammed the screen door behind him. Ordinarily, this small triumph would have cheered me up for hours; but tonight, I tasted nothing but ashes. Suddenly, his face appeared in the doorway.
"I'M GONNA TELL MA!" he yelled.
Instantly, like a cobra, I struck. Sweeping the stream quickly over the screen door, I got him again. Another scream of rage and he was gone. Again, I sank into the moody sea of depression. Was I going to boot the prom?
...A feeling of helpless rage settled over me as I continued spraying he lawn. I flushed out a poor, hapless caterpillar from under a bush, squirting him mercilessly full blast, until he washed down the sidewalk and disappeared into the weeds. I felt a twinge of evil satisfaction as he rolled over and over helplessly. It was getting dark. All that was left of the sun was a long, purple-orange streak along the western horizon. I had worked my way down to the edge of our weed, pock-marked bed of sod when, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something white approaching out of the gloom. I sprinkled on, not knowing that another piece was fitted into the intricate mosaic of adolescence. I kicked absent-mindedly at a passing toad as I soaked down the dandelions.
"What are you doing?"
So deeply was I involved in self-pity that at first my mind wouldn't focus. Startled, I swung my hose around, spraying the white figure on the sidewalk ten feet away.
"I'm sorry!" I blurted out, seeing at once that I had washed down a girl in white tennis clothes.
"Oh, hi Wanda. I didn't see you there."
She dried herself with a Kleenex.
"What are you doing?" she asked again.
"I'm sprinkling the lawn" The toad hopped past, going the other way now. I squirted him briefly, out of general principles.
"You've been playing tennis?" Since she was wearing tennis clothes and carrying a racked, it seemed like the right thing to say.
"Me and Ellen Akers were playing,down at the park," she answered.
Ellen Akers was a sharp-faced, bespectacled girl I had, inexplicably, been briefly in love with in the third grade. I had come to my senses by the time we got into 4B. It was a narrow escape. By then, I had begun to dimly perceive that there was more to women than being able to play a good game of Run, Sheep, Run.
"I'm sure glad school's almost over," she went on, when I couldn't think of anything to say. "I can hardly wait. I never thought I'd be a senior."
"Yeah," I said.
"I'm going to camp this summer. Are you?"
"Yeah," I lied. I had a job already lined up for the summer, working for a surveyor. The next camp I would see would be in the Ozarks, and I'd be carrying an M-1.
Wanda swung her tennis racket at a June bug that flapped by barely at stall speed. She missed. The bug soared angrily up and whirred off into the darkness.
"Are you going to college when you graduate next year?" she asked. For some reason, I didn't like the drift of the conversation.
"Yeah, I guess so, if I don't get drafted."
"My brother's in the Army. He's in the Artillery." Her brother, Bud Hickey, was a tall, laconic type four or five years older than both of us.
"Yeah, I heard. Does he like it?"
"Well, he doesn't write much," she said. "But he's gonna get a pass next September, before he goes overseas."
"How come he's in the Artillery?" I asked.
"I don't know. They just put him there. I guess because he's tall."
"What's that got to do with it? Do they have to throw the shells or something?"
"I don't know. They just did it."
Then it happened. Without thinking, without even a shadow of a suspicion of planning, I heard myself asking: "You going to the prom?"
For a long instant she said nothing, just swn her tennis racket at the air.
"I guess so," she finally answered, weakly.
"It's gonna be great," I said, trying to change the subject.
"Uh...who you going with?" She said it as if she really didn't care one way or the other.
"Well, I haven't exactly made up my mind yet." I bend down unconcernedly and pulled a giant milkweed out by the roots.
"Neither have I," she said.
It was then I realized there was no sense fighting it. Some guys are born to dance foever with the Daphne Bigelows on shining ballroom floors under endless starry skies. Others--well, they do the best they can. I didn't know that yet, but I was beginning to suspect something.
"Wanda?"
"Yes?"
"Wanda. Would you...well...I mean...would you, you see, I was thinking..."
"Yes?"
Here I go, in over the horns: "Wanda, uh...how about...going to the prom with me?"
She stopped twitching her tennis racket. The crickets cheeped, the spring air was filled with the sound of singing froglets. A soft breeze carried with it the promise of a rich summer and the vibrant aromas of a nearby refinery.
She began softly, "Of course, I've had a lot of invitations, but I didn't say yes to any of them yet. I guess it would be fun to go with you," she ended gamely.
"Yea, well, naturally, I've had four of five girls who wanted to go with me, but I figured that they were mostly jerks anyway, and...ah...I meant to ask you all along."
The die was cast. There was no turning back. It was an ironclad rule. Once a girl was asked to the prom, only a total crumb would ever consider ducking out of it. There had been one or two cases in the past, but the perpetrators had become social pariahs, driven from the tribe to fend for themselves in the unfriendly woods.
32 The story goes much longer with intricate details of a nerve-filled evening with all sorts of twists and turns. I don't wish to spoil it here; rather I wanted you to sample this incredible writer's style and keep the story in mind for a nice forty-five minute read. You'll be charmed!
33 Cute stuff, and it holds up reasonably well for an older story.
34 Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories went, in the present vernacular, "viral" in its time.
35 You can see why. It even reached the shores of Playboy Magazine, ensuring it's permanent place in nerdy-guy history.
36 And on and on.
37 Moving On, Part Two: That musty little paperback also had a marvelous piece by humorist Max Shulman, a jack-of-all writing trades and creator of one of the American classic lover boys, Dobie Gillis.
38 The Gillis character was a college everyman, if there is such a thing, who balances his life between trying to make it successfully through high school, college and ultimately, to success in America while being distracted by his habit of falling for every beautiful girl he sees.
39 The American Way of Laughter paperback included a Dobie Gillis short story by Shulman entitled The Unlucky Winner. In the story, Gillis has just gotten over a girl named Clothilde Ellingboe.
40 It isn't long before Dobie's first person narration allows the reader to understand her character. Here are the opening paragraphs to The Unlucky Winner:
My next girl is going to be honest. I don't care if she looks like a doorknob. Just so she's honest.
This determination arises from a late unhappy attachment to one Clothilde Ellingboe. Now, don't misunderstand. I'm not calling Miss Ellingboe a crook. Let's say she was irresponsible. Or unethical. Or unprincipled. Or amoral. Let's not go around calling ladies crooks. Watch that stuff.
How's THAT for an opening hook? He goes on to tell of how he fell head-over-heels for her, at one point reminiscing how beautiful it all was...
We were out every night--dancing, movies, sleigh rides, hay rides, weiner roasts, bridge games, community sings...
You get the idea. His conscience told him that he needed to put his head back into his studies, but she told him he was working too hard. Translate a book into Latin? She taught him that he could find anything in a library and that there are already pieces translated. In other words, why work so hard when you can cheat your way through college? In political science, she could find a piece of paper that has the essentials of the entire course syllabus outlined. She could name all the dates and Kings and significant historical events on a piece of paper the size of a bookmark if he had to stress a history test. In short, she was a crook.
"That is all very well..." he tells her. "But I don't feel I'm learning anything."
She eventually tells him that of course he is learning something: he is learning how to be a "...well rounded-out personality."
41 She keeps distracting him with dates that include going to a dance, joining a frat, and partying constantly.
42 One evening, his English professor, one Mr. Hamrick informs the class that they must turn in a perfect essay on any topic, due Friday. And it had better be awesome. And no excuses if they're late.
43 Dobie had done well in the class, due in large part to Clothilde showing him how to find summaries of books from the Book Review Digest. But this assignment...well, he knows he won't be able to get away with such nonsense, and he tells her so.
44 I'll shorten this, but hopefully you might be drawing parallels to modern students' tendencies to pull such shenanigans: there is nothing new under the sun.
45 He starts on Tuesday, but she again interrupts, as Benny Goodman is coming to campus. She keeps distracting Dobie until Thursday night, when he insists on writing his theme.
46 She tells him he doesn't need to write an essay; she has connections to the stacks in the library. The stacks are a series of racks, ten in all, each with seven tiers, and if you have the right card (which she could finagle off a graduate student) you could gain access to the essay archives.
47 He goes with her, feeling "...like James Cagney in Only Angels Have Wings..." and envisions getting busted, flunking and then being arrested for plagiarism.
48 He finds a piece so flowery and lyrical that the first three-hundred or so words are one sentence describing a guy sitting "..in the arbor of the county seat, his limbs composed, a basin of cherry russet apples at his side, his meershaum filled with good shag..."
49 You get the idea. A meershaum is a pipe, and the shag would be the delicately wonderful tobacco.
50 Any normal teacher would see that the thing was obviously not the work of a young student in college and immediately separate it from the others.
51 Dobie instinctively knows this and upon turning it in wants instantly to confess to his teacher. Clothilde, of course, tells him he worries too much.
52 Mr. Hambrick calls Dobie into his chambers, but to Dobie's surprise, he thinks the piece ingenious, and enters it into a contest run by the State.
53 One of the judges is really old...
54 And is of course, the guy who wrote the original piece.
55 They pare it down to two finalists, and both are called in to speak with the author.
56 He berates Dobie's rival, ranting at the loss of the language, and how nobody writes anything worth a damn anymore. He then turns and says the same things to Dobie, telling him that it is pedantic and flowery, and just WHAT have we done to the language? He reluctantly gives the prize to Dobie's rival.
57 Dobie shrinks, and almost dies, but when everybody leaves, the story ends like this: the author walks up to Dobie and addresses him following the rant:
He took my arm. "I was tempted to give you the prize, boy. Mighty flattering to know that people are still reading Thoughts of my Tranquil Hours after all these years."
Then he was gone down the corridor, chuckling and running his walking stick across the radiators.
58 Ah, writing lessons come in all sorts of disguises.
59 This just might have been one of them.
60 Hope you enjoyed the lesson.
61 Gottago. Important things, don't you know.
62 See you again.
63 Peace.
37 Moving On, Part Two: That musty little paperback also had a marvelous piece by humorist Max Shulman, a jack-of-all writing trades and creator of one of the American classic lover boys, Dobie Gillis.
38 The Gillis character was a college everyman, if there is such a thing, who balances his life between trying to make it successfully through high school, college and ultimately, to success in America while being distracted by his habit of falling for every beautiful girl he sees.
39 The American Way of Laughter paperback included a Dobie Gillis short story by Shulman entitled The Unlucky Winner. In the story, Gillis has just gotten over a girl named Clothilde Ellingboe.
40 It isn't long before Dobie's first person narration allows the reader to understand her character. Here are the opening paragraphs to The Unlucky Winner:
My next girl is going to be honest. I don't care if she looks like a doorknob. Just so she's honest.
This determination arises from a late unhappy attachment to one Clothilde Ellingboe. Now, don't misunderstand. I'm not calling Miss Ellingboe a crook. Let's say she was irresponsible. Or unethical. Or unprincipled. Or amoral. Let's not go around calling ladies crooks. Watch that stuff.
How's THAT for an opening hook? He goes on to tell of how he fell head-over-heels for her, at one point reminiscing how beautiful it all was...
We were out every night--dancing, movies, sleigh rides, hay rides, weiner roasts, bridge games, community sings...
You get the idea. His conscience told him that he needed to put his head back into his studies, but she told him he was working too hard. Translate a book into Latin? She taught him that he could find anything in a library and that there are already pieces translated. In other words, why work so hard when you can cheat your way through college? In political science, she could find a piece of paper that has the essentials of the entire course syllabus outlined. She could name all the dates and Kings and significant historical events on a piece of paper the size of a bookmark if he had to stress a history test. In short, she was a crook.
"That is all very well..." he tells her. "But I don't feel I'm learning anything."
She eventually tells him that of course he is learning something: he is learning how to be a "...well rounded-out personality."
41 She keeps distracting him with dates that include going to a dance, joining a frat, and partying constantly.
42 One evening, his English professor, one Mr. Hamrick informs the class that they must turn in a perfect essay on any topic, due Friday. And it had better be awesome. And no excuses if they're late.
43 Dobie had done well in the class, due in large part to Clothilde showing him how to find summaries of books from the Book Review Digest. But this assignment...well, he knows he won't be able to get away with such nonsense, and he tells her so.
44 I'll shorten this, but hopefully you might be drawing parallels to modern students' tendencies to pull such shenanigans: there is nothing new under the sun.
45 He starts on Tuesday, but she again interrupts, as Benny Goodman is coming to campus. She keeps distracting Dobie until Thursday night, when he insists on writing his theme.
46 She tells him he doesn't need to write an essay; she has connections to the stacks in the library. The stacks are a series of racks, ten in all, each with seven tiers, and if you have the right card (which she could finagle off a graduate student) you could gain access to the essay archives.
47 He goes with her, feeling "...like James Cagney in Only Angels Have Wings..." and envisions getting busted, flunking and then being arrested for plagiarism.
48 He finds a piece so flowery and lyrical that the first three-hundred or so words are one sentence describing a guy sitting "..in the arbor of the county seat, his limbs composed, a basin of cherry russet apples at his side, his meershaum filled with good shag..."
49 You get the idea. A meershaum is a pipe, and the shag would be the delicately wonderful tobacco.
50 Any normal teacher would see that the thing was obviously not the work of a young student in college and immediately separate it from the others.
51 Dobie instinctively knows this and upon turning it in wants instantly to confess to his teacher. Clothilde, of course, tells him he worries too much.
52 Mr. Hambrick calls Dobie into his chambers, but to Dobie's surprise, he thinks the piece ingenious, and enters it into a contest run by the State.
53 One of the judges is really old...
54 And is of course, the guy who wrote the original piece.
55 They pare it down to two finalists, and both are called in to speak with the author.
56 He berates Dobie's rival, ranting at the loss of the language, and how nobody writes anything worth a damn anymore. He then turns and says the same things to Dobie, telling him that it is pedantic and flowery, and just WHAT have we done to the language? He reluctantly gives the prize to Dobie's rival.
57 Dobie shrinks, and almost dies, but when everybody leaves, the story ends like this: the author walks up to Dobie and addresses him following the rant:
He took my arm. "I was tempted to give you the prize, boy. Mighty flattering to know that people are still reading Thoughts of my Tranquil Hours after all these years."
Then he was gone down the corridor, chuckling and running his walking stick across the radiators.
58 Ah, writing lessons come in all sorts of disguises.
59 This just might have been one of them.
60 Hope you enjoyed the lesson.
61 Gottago. Important things, don't you know.
62 See you again.
63 Peace.
~H~
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