You’re insane he said, so I says, how do you know?
He says, because he is not insane and I’m not like him.
So I reply, how do you know you’re the one that’s not insane?
He smiles and points to the people around him. Because, says he, he’s like them and we outnumber you.
He had a point, but then I had the keys to the asylum and I guess at the end of the day, might is right.
At least that is what the voices tell me.
It came to pass long ago, when the earth was young and the internet a fishing term, that a baby boy was born to the farmer and his wife. The farmer was immensely pleased, as he had worked hard to build up his farm and needed a son to help him at his labours. The boy grew up quickly into a fine, handsome young lad of golden disposition, however it soon became apparent to the farmer and his wife that their son was bone idle. At first his mother attributed it to an artistic strain in their family, but since he did nothing but spend his days dreaming under the apple tree on the hill, they eventually realised that there would be no practical manifestation of his gift. Perhaps this is all a little unfair on the young lad, because whilst he had idle notions, he did sometimes show promise: like the time he thought to weave a 3ft daisy chain for his mother. He was however so immensely proud of this achievement that he kept the floral necklace for himself.
The years went by, and it was not long before his parents had passed away and the lad, now a young man, sat idly under the apple tree, contemplating what to do with his inheritance. The farm he had of course sold immediately as he knew not, and indeed cared not, what to do with it. The bag of gold sat heavily in his lap and he regretted having asked for quite so much.
An apple fell to the ground and rolled down the hill towards the road, and the young man in that instant decided to follow it and see the world that had not bothered him much before. He set off with a jaunty stride, gold in hand, dreams in his head, whistling a little tune his mother had taught him.
Not long after that, perhaps not even an hour, he began to feel hunger pangs and he wondered what he would do for food. It was quite a problem as he was in the middle of nowhere. In the distance however he spied a man sitting next to a cow, seemingly eating his lunch. He smiled, pleased with his good fortune, and ran towards the stranger. On arrival he greeted the man and asked if he could have some of his bread and cheese. The man looked at him with some surprise, no doubt wondering whether an exchange was to be offered, but since none was forthcoming and being a charitable fellow, he shared his lunch with the young man. They fell to talking, or at least the young man talked at length about himself, until he noticed that the cow was a milk cow.
“Sir, I don’t suppose you would give me your cow, so I can have milk the rest of my days and need not go hungry?”
The man replied, “Son, I have just acquired this cow through a trade and am not inclined to give it away.” The young man looked so downcast that the man continued, “However I did exchange some magic beans for it, and if you hurry you might be able to catch up with the youngster I gave them to. Perhaps he would give you one or two.”
The young man cheered up immediately and was about to run off when he thought, “this bag of gold will slow me down, I shall give it to the man.” So he did, and set off at pace. Nightfall fell, as it usually does, and he came to small cottage in which a cosy light shone. He knocked on the door and enquired if he might have lodgings for the night. The owner of the cottage, an elderly woman and her young lad were only too glad to have visitors, for it had not been a good day. Their only cow, Tulip, had been foolishly exchanged by her son that morning for a handful of supposedly magic beans. The young man made himself at home an regaled them during supper with dreamy tales. When they enquired as to his destination he said he was looking for some magic beans he had heard about.
“Magic beans?” cried the woman, “Not you too? How strange Fortune is. We have some beans lying outside our window which you may freely have, but I doubt they are magic. However it is late and I suggest we turn in and attend to this tomorrow.” They bade each other good night and settled down to sleep, the young man sharing a bed with the woman’s son.
Dawn broke, but instead of the radiant morning sunshine, a green hue shone through the cottage windows. At first the occupants thought that the world was about to end and fell to praying, but when nothing happened, decided to go outside instead and investigate. It will no doubt not come as a surprise to you that a gigantic bean stalk had grown overnight from the magic beans and extended many miles up into the sky.
“Let’s climb it!” exclaimed the lad.
“No, it is not safe.” replied the mother.
The young man turned to her, “Do not fret, you have been so kind to me. I will hold it steady while he climbs.” The reality was that he had developed over the years a keen nose for strenuous activity and how to avoid it and this bean stalk had strenuosity written all over it!
The lad clambered quickly, watched anxiously by his mother, and soon disappeared from their sight. They stood a while, but since chores wait for no one, the mother soon went inside to attend to them. The young man settled down for a nap under the leafy shade of the bean stalk. He must have slept for a good few hours because when he awoke the sun was past noon. He wondered what had awoken him, but soon heard frantic rustling as the young lad climbed down with a hen under his arm.
“Quick, quick!” the young lad cried. “Fetch the axe.”
Fortunately his mother heard, because the idle young man knew not what fetch meant, and detecting the urgency in her son’s voice ran out with the axe.
The boy reached the ground, gasping for breath. “Giant… hen… golden eggs… coming … cut it down!”
Seeing that the young man was not hearing him, and indeed had wandered off into the orchard to look for apples, he grabbed the axe from his mother and began to frantically chop at the bast of the bean stalk. A giant roar from on high only served to increase his pace and soon the bean stalk gave a violent creak and tottered mightily. A second roar was heard, this time more like a screech, as the bean stalk began to tumble to the ground, casting its gigantic clamberer to the earth, to his death, into the apple orchard, where a young man of idle notions wondered when his fortune would hit him.
If you are a familiar reader of such fairy stories, you will no doubt be wondering what the moral is. Well fear not, here it is: “Don’t you have anything better to do than read tales of idleness?”
Twins were not particularly remarkable in the great city of Nineveh, but what was unusual about the two Jonas brothers was that they were in fact both called Jona. The reason was very simple: they were identical in very respect, so much so that even their mother could not tell them apart and had to resort to giving them the same name to avoid embarrassment. The consequence of this was that the two brothers rarely left each other’s company, for fear of being mistaken for the other, and were generally known as the Jonas.
So it came to pass that the two brothers were sitting on the hilltop overlooking Nineveh, when the word of the Lord came to one of the brothers.
“Jona, behold Nineveh the great city. Its iniquity has grieved me and I want to destroy it, but before that you must go and preach a message of repentance to them so that they will have one last chance to turn and thus avoid my wrath.”
Jona looked at his brother, who was dozing pleasantly in the sun and had clearly not heard any of this.
“Lord,” he replied, “I cannot do this on my own. Let me take my brother Jona with me.”
The Lord replied, “That would be two confusing. Now go, or I will smite you.”
Jona leapt to his feet and ran off, foolishly hoping to escape the wrath of God.
The rest is the stuff of legend and is documented in the book of Jonah in the Bible. Jona boarded a ship which ended up being stricken in a mighty storm that the Lord had sent. It was clear to the crew that something was amiss with Jona so with his consent they threw him to the waves where a large fish ate Jona.
That would have been the end of that, except that his brother had not been sleeping at all, and had heard the word of the Lord, but being slightly more cunning than his brother had feigned sleep.
He agonised over what to do, and when his brother did not return, thought that perhaps he should do as the Lord had requested, and thus avert a great smiting. This he did, and to his immense surprise, the whole city, including the King, repented with sackcloth and ashes, and the Lord did relent as per his word.
Over the years this story of mercy and hope has been retold and passed through the generations, and though some little changes have been made here and there, it stands in essence as a lesson to us all.
And no, it was not a whale. That’s just silly.
“This is our compartment”, Ariel said, sliding the door open and entering, throwing her bag onto the overhead luggage shelf. “You coming or what?”
I lingered a while, enjoying the moment. I loved these old trains, the expansive compartments, the lush wooden panelling, the gilded edging. Finally I entered and made myself comfortable opposite Ariel who had already pulled out her best seller.
I watched her as she read, twenty-three year old ginger-haired beauty with a fabulous collection of freckles and a cute nose that I had kissed on more than one occasion.
She looked up suddenly and caught me staring. “What you looking at, creep?”
I smiled. She had such a way with words.
“Oh, just some old bag I picked up.”
Fire sparked in her eyes and she leapt forward. “I’ll give you old!” and soon we were entangled in mock battle involving tickles and snatched kisses.
The compartment door opened. “Oh, excuse me, dreadfully sorry,” spoke a gentle educated voice.
We ceased our rough and tumble and looked at the unwelcome intruder: a slender, bespectacled man in tweed who looked and smelled like my maths lecturer.
“8th floor.”
I looked at him: fine tailored suit, diamond studded cuff links, and took an instant dislike to his smarmy, upper class face; “Sorry, sir, this is the odd floor lift; you’ll have to take the other lift over there for even numbers.”
He looked at me with incredulity, “But… but … the button is just there!”
I met his stare stonily, “Really very sorry, sir. but I have to abide by hotel policy.”
I saw the glint in his eye before he lunged for the button, and was ready for him, forcing him into an easy but very painful shoulder lock which made him cry out with pain. “Sir, as I have already said, this is the odd lift and you will have to leave.”
(Fictional Six Sentence)
My wife sat down on the couch next to me as I was flipping channels.
She asked, ‘What’s on TV?’
I said, ‘Dust.’
And then the fight started…
******************************************
My wife and I are watching “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire” while we were in bed.
I turned to her and said, “Do you want to have sex?”
“No,” she answered.
I then said, “Is that your final answer?”
She didn’t even look at me this time, simply saying, “Yes.”
So I said, “Then I’d like to phone a friend.”
And then the fight started….
******************************************
Saturday morning I got up early, quietly dressed, made my lunch, grabbed the dog, and slipped quietly into the garage. I hooked up the boat up to the truck, and proceeded to back out into a torrential downpour. The wind was blowing 50 mph, so I pulled back into the garage, turned on the radio, and discovered that the weather would be bad all day.
I went back into the house, quietly undressed, and slipped back into bed. I cuddled up to my wife’s back, now with a different anticipation, and whispered, “The weather out there is terrible.”
My loving wife of 10 years replied, “Can you believe my stupid husband is out fishing in that?”
And that’s how the fight started…
******************************************
I rear-ended a car this morning. So, there we were alongside the road and slowly the other driver got out of his car. You know how sometimes you just get soooo stressed and little things just seem funny? Yeah, well I couldn’t believe it…. He was a DWARF!!!
He stormed over to my car, looked up at me, and shouted, “I AM NOT HAPPY !!!”
So, I looked down at him and said, “Well, then which one are you?”
And then the fight started…..
*****************************************
My wife was hinting about what she wanted for our upcoming anniversary.
She said, ‘I want something shiny that goes from 0 to 150 in about 3 seconds.’
I bought her some bathroom scales.
And then the fight started…
******************************************
When I got home last night, my wife demanded that I take her someplace expensive… so, I took her to a gas station.
And then the fight started…
******************************************
After retiring, I went to the Social Security office to apply for Social Security. The woman behind the counter asked me for my driver’s license to verify my age. I looked in my pockets and realized I had left my wallet at home. I told the woman that I was very sorry, but I would have to go home and come back later.
The woman said, ‘Unbutton your shirt’. So I opened my shirt revealing my curly silver hair. She said, ‘That silver hair on your chest is proof enough for me’ and she processed my Social Security application. When I got home, I excitedly told my wife about my experience at the Social Security office.
She said, ‘You should have dropped your pants. You might have gotten disability, too.’
And then the fight started….
******************************************
My wife and I were sitting at a table at my high school reunion, and I kept staring at a drunken lady swigging her drink as she sat alone at a nearby table.
My wife asked, ‘Do you know her?’
‘Yes,’ I sighed, ‘She’s my old girlfriend. I understand she took to drinking right after we split up those many years ago, and I hear she hasn’t been sober since.’
‘My God!’ says my wife, ‘who would think a person could go on celebrating that long?’
And then the fight started…
******************************************
I took my wife to a restaurant. The waiter, for some reason, took my order first.
“I’ll have the strip steak, medium rare, please.”
He said, “Aren’t you worried about the mad cow?””
Nah, she can order for herself.”
And then the fight started…
******************************************
A woman is standing nude, looking in the bedroom mirror. She is not happy with what she sees and says to her husband, ‘I feel horrible; I look old, fat and ugly.
I really need you to pay me a compliment.’
The husband replies, ‘Your eyesight’s damn near perfect.’
And then the fight started…..
“8th floor.”
I looked at him: fine tailored suit, diamond studded cuff links, and took an instant dislike to his smarmy, upper class face; “Sorry, sir, this is the odd floor lift; you’ll have to take the other lift over there for even numbers.”
He looked at me with incredulity, “But… but … the button is just there!”
I met his stare stonily, “Really very sorry, sir. but I have to abide by hotel policy.”
I saw the glint in his eye before he lunged for the button, and was ready for him, forcing him into an easy but very painful shoulder lock which made him cry out with pain. “Sir, as I have already said, this is the odd lift and you will have to leave.”
I watched the man out of the corner of my eye: dark hair, sinister eyebrows, a Lenin style beard and tightly clutched suitcase. I wondered about its contents, that little suitcase. Could this be a Russian spy, and assassin, or perhaps a mad scientist with his newly invented super virus in dry frost-encased vials? I looked at my wife anxiously, but she was oblivious to the danger that lurked scarcely 5 feet away. I nudged her and glanced pointedly at the man, my expression conveying the terror I felt, and was glad to see that she sensed and shared my concern. The man looked up, saw us watching, but hurriedly averted his eyes, I suppose for fear of giving his game away, and then, slowly, opened his suitcase, and took out what looked like a cheese sandwich.
The heat was terrible and I honestly don’t know why people do it, but there I was, in the sauna, sweating buckets and really not having a good time. Two pretty young things entered, giggling away at some shared joke, and, ignoring me sat down on the opposite bench. The first was wearing the ugliest one piece black swimming suit I have ever seen; you know, the ones with the frilly trim for the sake of modesty? The other had on the skimpiest of bikinis, which normally would have raised my temperature, but this being the sauna, my body thermometer had nowhere to go. They chattered on inanely about the things women like to talk about, while I pretended I wasn’t listening, well I really wasn’t listening because for my sanity I had to zone out of the discussion on bikini wax technique. Then after a few minutes they left, and I wondered if it was the heat that had made me invisible, or perhaps my age, because it certainly wasn’t anything I said.
Have you ever wondered why there are such diverging views about God? I have, and it bothers me.
I read passages like Romans 1:20 “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse”, and I expect the religious landscape to be simpler, for things to be clearer. They are not.
But then you look at any complex issue and there will be a whole raft of different views, so why would God be any different?
It needs to be different because its a matter of life and death.
