Posts by Dr. Boli
FROM THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION.
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WEDDING CUSTOMS AROUND THE WORLD.
In Sydney Mines, Nova Scotia, the wedding ceremony is completed when the bride and groom exchange and discard traditional gifts of pickled herring.
In the Fortunate Isles, every dish at the wedding-feast must include lingonberries, imported from Scandinavia at almost ruinous expense.
Brides in Milan will not specify a wedding gown until they have made themselves thoroughly familiar with the latest fashions from Boise, Idaho.
In Mmadinare, Botswana, a marriage cannot be solemnized until the bride has acquired a library card under her new name.
In Glassport, Penna., the traditional wedding brawl often involves police from as many as three neighboring boroughs and townships.
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REMARKABLE CATS.
When the Forrest family moved from No. 1258 Sparse Street in Sandusky to No. 1263 Sparse Street, Aung San Suu Kitty, their Burmese cat, managed to find her way unaided from the old house to the new, by way of Mombasa.
Three of the world’s largest oil companies are owned by feline partnerships.
A Persian cat named Percival heroically saved his owners from a fire by deliberately knocking heavy objects off the dresser until they woke up. In so doing he partially atoned for having set the fire by deliberately knocking over the kerosene lamp.
Julian Hawthorne’s cat Rosemary actually wrote most of his novels, but Mr. Hawthorne loved her so dearly that he took the blame for them.
In ancient Egypt, cats were worshiped as gods, and expensive sofas were sacrificed to propitiate them.
When Dick Whittington was Lord Mayor of London, his cat (the second one he had owned), who controlled all access to the Lord Mayor, grew rich through bribery and corruption, and became Lord Mayor twice after Whittington’s death.
Jingles, a cat of indeterminate breed owned by Miss Felicity Barron-Crackle, has turned up his nose at a different brand of cat food every day since December 3, 2007.
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FROM THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION.
ANNOUNCEMENT.
This evening at Holy Republic Nondenominational Church in Cranberry, Dr. Orbin S. Thicke, Ph.D., fellow of the Institute for Noachian Studies, will confound the evolutionists with the one question they dare not answer, in a lecture entitled “What Did House Wrens Do Before There Were Houses?” The public is welcome, and godless atheists are particularly invited to attend, as long as they know how to dress appropriately. The lecture begins promptly at 7 p.m. and will be followed by a short performance featuring the Holy Republic Intelligent Design Handbell Choir.
ASK DR. BOLI.
Dear Dr. Boli: The bishop preached at our little church tonight, and I noticed he was carrying a staff with a hook in the top. It was too tall to be a cane, and anyway he walks without difficulty. So what’s the meaning of the crooked staff? —Sincerely, A Puzzled Lutheran.
Dear Sir or Madam: The bishop’s crook or crozier is an ancient symbol of episcopal authority, representing the bishop’s role as shepherd of his flock. A shepherd uses his crooked staff to retrieve straying sheep. In the same way, a bishop visiting a church, as soon as he notices any dangerous liturgical irregularity, can use the hook at the end of his staff to yank the celebrant away from the altar. At least that is how the thing is supposed to work, but Dr. Boli regrets to note that the vanity of some bishops, who have been seduced by the trappings of their exalted rank, has led them to fill the hook in the staff with intricate carved ornament, thus rendering it useless for its intended purpose.
THINGS WE SIMPLY CANNOT IMPROVE.
The Tragedy of Chrononhotonthologos: being the most tragical tragedy that ever was tragediz’d by any Company of Tragedians. Written by Benjamin Bounce Esq. Edinburgh, 1734. —“Benjamin Bounce” is really Henry Carey, who in this play produced the blank-verse tragedy beyond which no blank-verse tragedy can ever go.
What other tragedy has ever introduced a character whose name alone takes up exactly one line of iambic pentameter? Yet here we have that character’s name, Aldiborontiphoscophornio, as the very first line of the play.
Or what tragedy has ever given us a more tragical speech than this?
A blow! Shall Bombardinion take a blow?
Blush! blush thou Sun! Start back the rapid Ocean!
Hills! Vales! Seas! Mountains! all, commixing, crumble,
And into chaos pulverize the world;
For Bombardinion has receiv’d a blow,
And Chrononhotonthologos shall die.
And could anything in Shakespeare equal this?
Ha! what have I done!
Go call a coach; and let a coach be call’d;
And let the man that calls it be the caller;
And, in his calling, let him nothing call
But Coach! Coach! Coach! O! for a coach, ye gods!
No, this must forever be the standard against which all other tragedies are measured. Fortunately, the original is available on Google Books, so when you need to measure a tragedy, you now have a proper measuring-stick.