I did some traveling this weekend. That left me with time to think- always a dangerous thing.

What I think is that it would be fun to have small blowgun powered tranquilizing darts under the counter. Then, whenever a person attempted to walk out of my store without making a purchase I could stick them with a dart. Of course, I wouldn’t want to hurt them in any way, but you’ve got to admit that it would be pretty entertaining if said people had blackouts in the range of three to five minutes. I would move them up to the sanctuary of the cathedral above our store and sit them in a pew. Upon waking, they’d have no idea how they got there! Good stuff.

I also think that I should start a Food Removal Service. It would be much like pest removal, only I would come into your house and eliminate all your unwanted carbs. I would do this by eating them. There might be a market for this sort of thing, you know? If anyone out there is interested…

Finally, have any of you ever seen “Bells are Ringing”? WOW. In high school I was part of the pit for that show. Mostly we in the brass section played practical jokes and baked cookies in our toaster oven. Since I was behind the curtain I never actually saw the show, until I watched a tape of my high school’s performance two days ago. Actually, I still haven’t seen the whole thing because even though I was in a car with a television for nearly three hours the darn thing just wouldn’t end. In fact, it was so long that they put credits in the middle of the production! Surely that’s a sign indicating no one should ever have to sit through Bells are Ringing from start to finish!

Certainly we didn’t have a particularly gifted cast or ensemble of musicians to work with, but if any show does itself in, Bells are Ringing is it. No matter how much better the clarinets could have played, or how much less awkwardly some of those actors could have graced the stage, “Bells are Ringing” would still be awful. Apparently someone disagrees with me, though, because I learned today that it won several Tony Awards in 1956. I personally think it’s a miracle that any of us associated with my high school’s production ever were accepted to college anywhere.

Anyway, more on musicals some other time. If you’ve seen Bells are Ringing share your thoughts here! If you haven’t, do whatever you can to stay away! If you have the itch to see a (good) musical I can make some recommendations…

Hi everyone

Here’s a message from Keith Pozzuto, employee of the month for 8 straight months. “Law is fluid. By the way, what’s so confusing about our menu?”

In other news, I’ve realized that I am to a human being what a Hummer is to a vehicle. That is to say I’m big, hunky, and have a remarkably large gas tank that gets astonishingly low mileage to the gallon. Well, maybe only one of those things is true, and we all know which one it is. It’s a good thing I work in a fabulous restaurant where quick refueling is always an option! I find that a fruit shake and El Greco is roughly the equivalent of premium gasoline. Keeps you running better longer.

Well, soon I’m going to continue that story about my high school physics teacher. In the mean time, a round of applause to Mr. Brian O’Neill of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Check out page A2 of the June 23 edition…

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05174/526967.stm

A woman stepped out of the Volvo and walked into Cheryl’s. She looked a lot like Uno, she faxed some physics assignments, but surprisingly she had two hands.

“Do you know Uno?,” Doug queried.

“Oh sure, she’s my sister. She’s been terribly ill and can’t get out of bed, so I’ve been faxing these assignments to her students,” Uno’s sister replied.

“Oh,” I said, “please let her know her sixth period physics class is thinking of her. We hope she’s alright.”
“Thanks, that will mean so much to her,” responded the sister.

As soon as the Volvo pulled away we turned to Max, the man behind the counter, and inquired as to whether this was the same woman who had made physics faxes on other days.

“No,” Max exclaimed, “Every other day a different, woman has faxed something. A woman with only ONE hand.”

Puzzled, Doug and I headed off to school.

To be continued…

With Cheryl’s Deli in mind, my friend Doug and I decided to try and catch up with Uno. After school one day Doug headed over to Short Hills and talked to a man named Max who worked at Cheryl’s Deli. Max confirmed that a woman with one hand had been faxing physics assignments from his restaurant every morning for about the past two weeks. After asking Max to say hello to Uno from her sixth period physics class, Doug headed back to Summit.

The next day we received a fax from Uno as usual. After some thinking Doug and I decided that we would try to intercept Uno at the fax machine in Cheryl’s Deli the next morning. So, he picked me up at 5 am and we staked out at the Short Hills train station, across from Cheryl’s for the next few hours. By 7 am we had moved into the deli itself, and shortly thereafter Uno’s tan volvo pulled up in front of the store.

To be continued

Well, the weather is cooling off. We’ve been spoiled by this warm stuff for so long. Nonetheless, I hops sunny days return to Pittsburgh soon! In the mean time let’s continue that story from last week…

One day in March Uno didn’t come into school and we had a substitute. She faxed in an assignment from our book, which of course we didn’t do. Before we knew it one day had become two weeks and we started wondering what was going on. After approaching our principal we learned that no one knew where Uno was. We also discovered that Uno had recently been informed that she would not be receiving her tenure. At that point we started to feel a touch guilty about our behavior over the past year and determined it wan necessary to take matters into our own hands.

For the duration of her absence Uno had continued to fax us assignments on a daily basis. As concerned students we took it upon ourselves to trace the location of her faxes using our only link to the outside world, the classroom telephone. After calling information we learned that all her faxes were coming from Cheryl’s Deli in neighboring Short Hills, NJ.

To be continued…

I mailed my taxes today. Sure am glad THAT’s off my chest. Now it’s time for a story. By the way, I am NOT making this up.

During my senior year of high school I had a one-handed physics teacher, we’ll call her Uno. Legend has it she lost her other hand sky diving.

Anyway, Uno was a very sweet and knowledgeable woman, but she had very little control of her classes. On any given day, someone would ask to go to the bathroom and come back twenty minutes later with a milk shake in their hands. There were even times when someone would use the phone in the classroom to order Chinese food and have it delivered!

To be continued…