dear old sweet Lu meets franksolich

[franksolich]

dear old sweet Lu meets franksolich.  “’Bye, dear,” Lu said, as she kissed her husband, bewhiskered Bill in faded overalls, as he began walking out the door, headed to his job on the night-shift at the sawmill. 

Grey-haired Bill was of average height, and approaching retirement, and he walked with a slight limp in one leg.

Lu had tenderly fixed him his favorite food, white-bread sandwiches with sliced liverwurst, and wrapped them in waxed paper, so their odor wouldn’t mix with the guacamole she’d put in his lunch bucket, one of those one-gallon Karo syrup cans with a handle.

“Such a good man,” Lu thought, as she watched him walking in the semi-darkness through the snow-covered eucalyptus trees congesting the front yard of their isolated cabin in the mountains and forests of western North Carolina.

“He’s such a sweetie, and looks so cute, like an overgrown leprechaun.”

As Bill receded into the distance, Lu decided that while it was late, she should make out a shopping list for groceries in the morn, as they were running low on provisions.  Then she’d go to bed for the night.

It didn’t take her long to make up the list; the usual FiberCon, Bisacodyl, mineral oil, Ducolax, Nature’s Remedy, flax seed oil, Correctol, prune juice, Metamucil, raw oatmeal, Black Draught, castor oil, Ex-Lax, Blue Heron Fiber and Stool Softener, canelli beans, and kale.

When she was done, and as she was turning out the lights, she looked out to the front yard, seeing a figure moving among the trees.

Oh no, she thought; a tramp, and Bill’s already gone.

She grabbed the antique flintlock musket, and loading it, walked out to the front porch, hoping to scare him away with her Ma Kettle-like stance and attire.

She hollered at him, but he didn’t respond, instead continuing to stroll towards the house as if she hadn‘t said anything at all.

As he got nearer, Lu relaxed a bit; he didn’t look like a tramp.  In fact, he looked respectable.

But it was most singular, the way he was dressed, as if out of British East Africa in the 1920s, tan bush helmet, tan shirt, and tan safari shorts.

to be continued

[Skul]

  

[ColonelCarrots]

This is going to be good.

[GOBUCKS]

I hope there's some hopping around.

[franksolich]

I hope there's some hopping around.

Upon reaching the bottom of the steps leading up the front porch, he finally saw Lu, and stopped.

Oh geezuz, the stranger thought, examining Ma Kettle with the flintlock musket pressed against her bosom.

It wasn’t a situation he hadn’t been in before; she was obviously a woman alone out in the middle of nowhere, and he being a man, had frightened her.

He stepped back about four feet away from the bottom step, so as to appear what he was, non-threatening.

As Lu clung to her blunderbuss, he told her his name and where he was from.

Now, dear old sweet Lu had no idea where “Nebraska” was; she assumed it was somewhere out west, in between Idaho and Oregon, and thought his a most peculiar accent.  Every word was crystal-clear and distinct, but he took too much care with it.  It seemed practiced, not natural.

He told her his car had broken down on the road back a ways.

“It’s late at night now, and I suppose there’s nobody around who can deal with it.  It’s a good thing I’m in no hurry--I’m on my way to visit my good pal JohnnyReb down over by Charleston, South Carolina, although it’s a surprise; he has no idea I’m coming--and I can wait until day-time.

“However, I don’t have a telephone, and am wondering if in the morning, you could call someone for me, to come out and fix the car.”

Ma Kettle relaxed with the musket.

Actually, the stranger had hoped to find habitation for the night, too, but given that she was a woman alone, it wasn’t a good idea; she might feel uncomfortable sleeping in the house alone with a strange man.

Before she could extend the habitual southern hospitality--which would be reluctant after all--he relieved her of that obligation by adding, “And I’ll sleep in the car tonight.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

In the morning, while bewhiskered Bill, off from work, was dining upon hot Karo syrup poured over raw oatmeal, and Lu was having a bowl of kale-and-cannelli gruel, she described the stranger from the preceding night, and was somewhat indignant.

“He could’ve asked to stay the night in the house, where it’s warm and dry, but he acted as if our house wasn’t good enough for him, and went to sleep in his car.”

Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face ruminated upon that.

“But he’s not from around here, and probably didn’t know,” he finally pointed out.

“By the way, who did you call to help him--Andy or Gomer?”

“I haven’t called anybody yet.  It’s early.  I wanted to know what you thought of it,” Lu replied.

“Good,” Bill said, tugging at the straps of his faded blue overalls.  “I got to get some sleep sooner or later, but it’d be best if I go out and see exactly what’s wrong first.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Finishing breakfast, bewhiskered Bill went out to look.  The car was in the woods, about three-quarters of a mile away from the house.  Not seeing the stranger, he looked inside the vehicle, seeing the stranger slumbering as if an infant in the back seat.

Bill hollered.  The stranger slumbered on.

Bill rapped on the window.  The stranger slumbered on.

Bill reached inside the front door and honked the horn.  The stranger slumbered on.

Finally, Bill opened a door to the back seat, and tugged at the stranger’s legs.

The stranger abruptly awoke and sat up, rubbing his eyes.  After gathering who Bill was, he introduced himself and explained the problem.

He and Bill walked to the front of the vehicle, to look over all that was wrong.

Tugging at the straps on his faded blue overalls, Bill whistled.

“I know,” the stranger said; “it looks pretty bad and all that, but at least it’s my own car.  If it was somebody else’s car, I’d be devastated.

“You see, back home, people trust me with their motor vehicles all the time, because they know I handle them with kid gloves, and nothing’s ever happened to any of them.  Some of those cars and trucks, I’ve put more miles on them, than their owners.

“But this is only my car, so it doesn’t bother me.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Bewhiskered Bill, examining the problem, said “This is going to be a big job.”

“Probably,” the stranger said.  “Do you know anybody local who can fix it?”

Well, Bill said, “Even I could fix it, but it’d take a long time.  You see, three-quarters of the job and labor involves taking it apart; fixing it and putting it all back together wouldn’t be any time at all.

“I could do it myself, but you know, working nights and having to sleep days, and keeping the woman happy, well, you know--”

The stranger’s eyes brightened.  “Oh, but it’d be a piece of cake then,” he suggested, “and I’d rather pay somebody I know, rather than somebody I don’t.

“You see, one of my functions back home, to make myself useful, is that I take things apart and lay them all out, and somebody who knows what he’s doing comes and fixes the problem and puts it back together, having been spared the preliminary drudge work.

“I’m very good at taking apart and laying out, and it saves the other person a lot of time and trouble.

“So if you’re willing, just tell me what I need to do, and I’ll do it myself, while you’re working and sleeping and keeping the wife mellow, and then when you got time, you could finish it up.

“I’d rather pay you, than somebody I don’t know.”

Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face ruminated upon that.  The idea of a couple hundred bucks pleased him, but looking at the stranger, he was dubious of the stranger’s alleged skills.

“Well,” he finally said, “first, you’d have to take out the fan, and then the radiator, and then take off the front axle and remove the oil pan and engine block--”

“No problem,” said the stranger; “done it all before.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

“Despite appearances, I don’t think he’s none too bright,” bewhiskered Bill advised Lu upon returning home. 

Bill had returned home, promising the stranger had after he’d gotten a little bit of sleep today, he’d return with a tent-canopy to hoist above the disabled motor vehicle, so as to keep things at least somewhat dry while they were taken out and put back in.

“He says he can tear it apart--says he’s done it before, but I dunno.

“He just doesn’t strike me as someone who knows the ‘how to’ and has the muscle for the ’can do.’”

“Well, be careful,” Lu advised, sending him off to bed while she got ready to go get some groceries. 

“Be careful that you don’t end up doing most of the work he says he’ll do.

“He may be as dumb as a rock, but you know the type; they’re Albert Einsteins when it comes to getting other people to do their work for them.”

- - - - - - - - - -

Some hours later, as afternoon began fading into suppertime, bewhiskered Bill went back to the stranger and his car, carrying with him a large piece of canvas and some tools he thought might be useful.

When he came to the clearing, he stopped abruptly in his tracks.  Real quick.

The stranger was on the ground on his back, underneath the automobile.  He’d already taken off the fan and the radiator, laying them carefully aside, and propping the car up on blocks, was at the moment disassembling the front axle.

But that wasn’t what discombobulated Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face.

There was a rattlesnake--only an average-sized one, maybe six feet long, but small rattlesnakes are just as deadly as big ones--slithering around the prone body underneath the vehicle, hissing and rattling up a storm.

Bewhiskered Bill thought the noise deafening.

He also thought the stranger surely bitten and dead now.

But then suddenly one hand of the stranger poked out through the underneath, feeling around the ground for a large S/K adjustable wrench.  Almost grabbing the head and neck of the snake, he got instead what he wanted, and pulled back under.

Bill, tugging at the straps of his faded blue overalls, watched mesmerized as the snake circled the car to the other side, where the other hand of the stranger reached out to grope for the flashlight.  This time the hand again nearly grasped the head and neck of the snake, but landed on the flashlight at the last second.

Bewhiskered Bill couldn’t holler, because it’d startle the snake, and one doesn’t startle rattlesnakes.

But he couldn’t figure out why the stranger wasn’t hearing the hissing and rattling, it was loud enough.

The stranger reached for a pair of vice-grips, grabbing the snake in mid-section.

Deciding no, that didn’t feel like a pair of vice-grip pliers, the stranger slowly began sliding out from underneath the car, while inexplicably the snake began slithering away, already out of sight by the time the stranger was sitting up on the ground, and seeing bewhiskered Bill standing there.

“Well, hello,” he said.  “Why, you look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

Still white as a ghost, bewhiskered Bill returned to the house, where Lu was fixing supper, which this evening was tofu, humus, quinoa and black beans, applesauce, and white bread with margarine.

“There’s something mighty strange about the stranger,” he told Lu; “he may be stupid, he doesn’t pay attention to anything he’s told, but he’s got something--I dunno what it is, just something--that protects him.

“And I get the feeling he’s not even aware he’s being protected from anything.”

“Well, I’m not liking him,” Lu said, “no matter how simple or innocent he seems to be.”

She got out a short thick black candle, and cleaning the table with a rag soaked in salt-water, used a chalk to outline a pentacle on the kitchen table.

Then she lit the candle and placed it in the center, chanting,

“I call on powers far and near
To banish what’s not welcome here.
By this candle, with this charm,
I banish all that would cause harm.
This I ask, this charge I lay.
Send unwanted things away.”

Just then, the stranger poked his head inside the front door.

“Hello, anybody home at the moment?”

to be continued

[Skul]

“You see, one of my functions back home, to make myself useful, is that I take things apart and lay them all out, and somebody who knows what he’s doing comes and fixes the problem and puts it back together, having been spared the preliminary drudge work.

A certified A&P might have cost $500. Fixing his FUP's cost him $1000.
Doctors/lawyers, that think their mechanics, have paid many of my bills.

Be careful that you don’t end up doing most of the work he says he’ll do.

Then you find they haven't. 
Fixing their FUP's is one thing. Handing them the bill is another. 
It's the old... "I've done half the work", sort of thing. 

[franksolich]

He stopped in his tracks, looking at Lu, not sure what she was saying.

Then, supposing she was inviting doggerl, he replied, “in nomine Jesu Christi Dei et Dómini nostri, intercedénte immaculáta Vírgine Dei Genetrice María, beáto Michaéle Archángelo, beátis Apóstolis Petro et Paulo et ómnibus Sanctis, et sacra ministérii nostri auctoritáte confisi, ad infestatiónes diabólicæ fraudis repelléndas secúri aggrédimur……”

Lu’s eyes shot daggers.

Oops, he’d miscalculated, insulting her.

It’s bad manners to upstage, to one-up, one’s hostess, he remembered, and so he backed off, apologizing.

“It’s really nothing, just a little something I memorized in college, along with some Shakespeare.”

Lu thought it something rather more than that, and remained hostile.

Trying to avoid her malicious look, he asked bewhiskered Bill, “would you happen to have a 1-3/8” drive ratchet I could borrow?  I‘m almost done removing the engine block, and can‘t find mine.”

to be continued

[Skul]

Umm, a 1-3/8 drive ratchet would be  out of the question. 3/4, I can live with.
Delete as you see fit.

[franksolich]

You know, you kind of bothered Lu with that,“ bewhiskered Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face reminded the stranger, as they were walking back to the propped-up car.

“She gets bent out of shape when people say things to her she doesn’t understand.”

Oh now, the stranger said; “it was just harmless doggerl; when I was in college, I had to memorize a lot of things--probably ended up memorizing half a library of things--I can do Ben Jonson and Marlowe and Acts of Parliament and Piers Ploughman too--and that one just happened to pop into the mind when I saw what she was saying.”

“Well, I hope you’re careful, though” bewhiskered Bill said, tugging at the straps of his faded blue overalls.

“You see, she’s into magic, and takes it personally when she thinks people are mocking her.”

- - - - - - - - - -

At the same time, back at the house, Lu was in the kitchen, bending over a large cast-iron Dutch oven sitting atop the natural gas stove.

“Round about the caldron go;
In the poison’d entrails throw.—
Toad, that under cold stone,
Days and nights has thirty-one;
Swelter’d venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot!

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wad of snot, fresh it’s not,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Piece of ass, bit of tail,
Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg, and owlet’s wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

Scale of dragon; tooth of wolf;
Witches’ mummy; maw and gulf
Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark;
Root of hemlock digg’d i the dark;
Liver of blaspheming Jew;
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Sliver’d in the moon’s eclipse;
Nose of Turk, and Tartar’s lips;
Barry’s piss, ‘Shell’s discharge;
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver’d by a drab,—
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron,
For the ingredients of our caldron.

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

“I think you’re worried too much about the stranger,” bewhiskered Bill said to Lu the next morning, as the cast-iron Dutch oven still sat on the stove top, simmering.

“Gomer and Andy met him, when I had them deliver the parts out there yesterday.

“When they showed up, he was sitting on top of a rock, talking to himself.  Not mumbling or anything, but talking loudly, as if he was practicing for a speech.

“But it was gibberish, what he was saying.

“He told Gomer and Andy it was ‘three blind mice’ as Julius Caesar would’ve recited it.  And then he did the same nursery rhyme the way Attila the Hun said it, and then the way William the Conqueror said it, and then as Louis XIV said it.

“He told them he has to do this often, so as ‘stay in practice,’ because if he doesn’t, he’ll forget how the words are pronounced.”

“Well, that’s silly,” Lu said; “who could forget how words are pronounced?--that has to be a special kind of stupid, to forget that.”

“I dunno,” Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face replied; “but Gomer and Andy think he’s dumber than a rock.  A nice guy, one of the nicest guys one can ever hope to meet, but dumber than a rock.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

“Well, since he’s so damned stupid, how come you’re not plucking him?” Lu asked, as she carefully wrapped the liverwurst sandwiches in waxed paper and put them in the Karo syrup can that Bill used as a lunch-bucket.

“When Goldie was here today and learned what the problem is, she said her husband usually charges something like a straight thousand bucks to do a like job.

“And Hazel said that one time she had to pay eight hundred for the same thing, even though she’s local and the mechanic used to make nice-nice with her when her husband was on the road.

“And you’re charging him only two hundred?”

Bewhiskered Bill tugged at the straps of his faded blue overalls.

“But Lu,” he explained, “most of the cost is the labor of tearing things down and putting them back together; replacing the part isn’t hardly any time or trouble at all. He’s already done three-quarters of the work himself, without my lifting a finger.

“The part cost seventy-five bucks, and he paid cash up front for it. My own labor’s going to be just a couple of hours, and when I told him ‘a hundred and twenty-five,’ he paid that in immediate cash too.

“I got a golden egg out of this goose; it’s not reasonable or right to demand more.”

“Well,” Lu said, stirring the contents of the simmering cast-iron Dutch oven on top of the natural-gas stove, “to a silly Christian ‘fundie’ burdened with scruples, it may not be right or reasonable, but we’re primitives, with no such qualms.

“One’s got to take what one can get, as quick as one can get it, and as much as one can get.”

Bill was getting ready to leave when he asked, “You know Lu, I don’t like the guy either, but to me, he’s just a minor irritant, an interruption in the daily routine around here, and he’s paying some bucks too, to make up for it.

“But you really seem to loathe him.

“Did he say something wrong to you the night he showed up here, something inappropriate??

No, Lu admitted; “it’s just that after he left and I checked the charts, I saw that the planets and moons and stars had all gotten out of kilter, which meant his coming here bode no good.

“But no good for whom, I’m not sure.  Him, or me, or you, or you and me.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

That night at the sawmill had been the last night of the work week for bewhiskered Bill, who planned on putting the stranger’s car back together the next two days, his days off.  And so after getting a few hours’ shut-eye in the morning, Bill tugged at the straps on his faded blue overalls and grabbing the flintlock musket in case he came across something worth hunting, walked out to the clearing.

And immediately stopped in his tracks upon reaching it.

The stranger was there, bent over, his head under the lifted hood, fiddling with something.

Next to him was standing a brown bear, at least eight feet tall and with considerable bulk.

The bear was evaluating dinner, sizing up the stranger for a swat.

Bewhiskered Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face froze in terror.

He uttered a cry, which the stranger didn’t hear, but the bear did.

Deciding that Bill looked better for cuisine, the bear turned and started rushing towards him.

Bill, his flintlock musket pretty much useless against such a beast, started clambering up a white-barked birch tree, to remain out of reach of the animal.  However, the bear had tree-climbing skills too, and wasn’t far behind.  The bear reached for the ascending Bill, ripping off the back door of his overalls.

However, no reason for the terrified Bill to be embarrassed, as underneath he was wearing a pair of home-sewn boxers lovingly made by Lu, “King Arthur’s Flour” spanning his rear end.

Both Bill and the bear kept climbing, the pursuing bear only a few feet behind.  Bill at times took the musket and holding it by the end of the barrel, tried swatting the bear away with the stock, but he might as well have been banging away with a fly-swatter. 

During one swipe, Bill lost the musket, it falling a few hundred feet to the ground below.  Now he was in trouble, but he still had some weaponry.  Bill slipped off one of his shoes, and began banging it on the top of the head of the advancing bear.

Miraculously, during one of those thumps, the bear lost its balance and suddenly fell off the tree, down to the middle of a briar patch on the ground, making all sorts of noises.  Getting up dazed, the bear decided he’d go find dinner somewhere else, and waddled off into the trees.

Bewhiskered Bill, all sweaty and tired, lost his balance, and fell the few hundred feet into the briar patch, raising a second ruckus.

The stranger had continued working on the automobile during all this racket and to-do, as if no dust was being stirred up, no noises made, no violence threatened.  When he finally pulled himself upright out of the engine and turned around, seeing bewhiskered Bill still putting himself back together in the briar patch, he looked startled.

“Good God, man,” the stranger said; “you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

“You know, you’re right, Lu,” bewhiskered Bill said, wincing as Lu vigorously applied a poultice of vinegar and baking soda to the cuts, lacerations, and scratches on his body.

“There’s something really odd about the stranger, and now I wish he’d just go away, that he’d never even come here.

“If he hadn’t already paid me for fixing his car, and if I hadn’t already spent it, I would order him away right now.  But, he already paid me and the money’s gone, so we’re stuck with him for a couple more days yet.

“I used to wonder if he was blind, because he doesn’t see a lot of things, like that big old mean rattlesnake the other day, or the big brown bear this morning.  And the giant feral boar Andy and Gomer had seen, that was going at him from behind, horns ready to gore, who changed course the last minute and chased Andy’s dog instead. 

“But he can’t be blind, because he drove all this way from Nebraska, and knows what he’s doing about taking the car apart.  One has to see, to do all that.

“There’s just something mighty peculiar about the stranger, and I’m not talking about how his hair’s too long.”

Lu reminded Bill she’d told him so.  “I noticed the night he showed up here, the planets and moons and stars suddenly went out of alignment, portending something bad.  But whether bad for him, or for us, I couldn’t tell.

“Yesterday, when Hedwig was here, we asked the Ouija board about him; it said everything he’s told us so far is true, not a lie in it.  Then we asked questions about things he hasn’t mentioned yet, and the spirit-rappers under the table illuminated us.

“He’s single, but taken.  No family.  Well-educated, but only in the arts, meaning he’s not making a whole lot of money in a job.  Well-traveled, but usually to places other people avoid, or at seasons other people stay away, such as wintering in Svalbaard or summering in Algiers.

“No, he hasn’t been to those places, but he’s been in southern Siberia in winter and Louisville, Kentucky in summer, and they’re practically the same thing.

“A man of strong likes and dislikes; he loves humanity, and loathes the primitives.

“And, as you might already know, not known for being particularly bright.”

to be continued

[franksolich]

“Well, at any rate, the car’s done, all’s squared away, and he’s leaving in the morning,” bewhiskered Bill told Lu.

Lu thought of something.  “But where’s he been staying, since he didn’t ask to stay here?”

Oh, Bill said, “he slept in the back seat of the car.  In the trunk, there’s one of those large wicker picnic baskets that he’d loaded up with food, and he’s been dining from that.  He wouldn’t dig a hole to contain a fire, either; says it makes a mess he doesn’t want to make, and food’s to be cooked on top of an electric range anyway, to be any good. 

“When it comes to personal needs, he walked to the convenience store in town.”

“But that’s a mile and a half,” Lu said.

“I know,” replied Bill’s Pennsylvania Dutch farmer’s face.  “I told him he’s out in the middle of nowhere and could spray or squat down as he wished, but he said no; apparently people camp on his property in Nebraska quite a bit, and do that, and he doesn’t like it.

“And besides, as he pointed out, he was raised with good manners; if there’s not porcelain under him, it’s no go, he waits until there is.

“And as for keeping himself clean, well, there’s the pond nearby.”

to be continued; two more short chapters to go, and then it's done

[franksolich]

In the morning, before Bill got home from the night shift at the sawmill, Lu put a pot of his favorite camomile-and-lye soup on the natural gas stove, and turned on the burner. 

However, she didn’t see the flame hadn’t taken, as she was in an anxious hurry to see if the stranger was really leaving.

Upon reaching the clearing where the automobile was parked and not seeing the stranger anywhere around, Lu walked over to a pond surrounded by high boulders.  Peeking through a pair of them, she saw the stranger, standing knee-deep in the water shaving the overnight hair off his chin.

Oh my, Lu thought.  It’s too bad the girls from the cooking and baking forum aren’t here with me, to see this.

And it’s a good thing Bill isn’t here, to see me look.

Lu watched as he waded out of the water and walked past the boulders on his way to the trunk of the car, which he reached without noticing her.  He opened the trunk and sifted through some clothing in a suitcase, and then suddenly saw her.

He saw what Lu was looking at, and asked her, irritated, “didn’t your mother teach you good manners, not to stare?”

Hmmmph, Lu retorted; “you’re prancing around on my territory like that, and you have the gall to accuse me of bad manners?”

Sorry, he said, sarcastically; “given where we’re at, I just figured nobody was around.”

Lu wished he wasn’t in quite such a hurry to get dressed.  She had her cellular telephone with her, and he saw it, but it didn’t bother him.  Perhaps he wasn’t aware such telephones were for more than just talking-and-listening, lots more than that.

Including snapping photographs.

to be continued; next, the finale, the end

[franksolich]

After the stranger, who by now was known to be franksolich, cleaned up the ground around the car, thanked her, and drove away, Lu hurried back to the house, as she wanted to telephone the girls in the cooking and baking forum with her nadinesque scoop, complete with pictures.

It was surely Lu’s finest hour, catching franksolich uncovered.

Lu began downloading the surreptitious photographs, so as to send them to primitives far and wide, but dear sweet old Lu however was not exactly computer-savvy, and it was taking her a while. 

She happened to notice that Bill’s soup wasn’t cooking yet, and saw that the burner needed lit.

Some miles away, in northern South Carolina, JohnnyReb was sitting on his front porch, reading the “Dear Abby” column in his newspaper when inexplicably crashed through the roof a copper-bottomed stainless-steel pot of camomile-and-lye soup, still cold.

the end