Posts by Dr. Boli
FIVE ABSOLUTELY TRUE NEWS STORIES THAT COULD BE APRIL FOOLS.
MISS WANDA PAYLE has successfully cornered the market on wind-up novelty pencil boxes, causing global prices of that commodity to rise an estimated 14%.
Police in Homestead have appealed to the public for help in identifying the gang of three masked men who broke into an empty storefront on Eighth Avenue late last night and set up a harpsichord shop.
The Burgerette Drive-Thru Inn of Sparse, Oklahoma, was struck by two tornadoes in the same afternoon. The first tornado knocked the structure off its foundation, but the second put it back.
A gang of sparrows rolled themselves in glitter and broke into the National Aviary, where they lived the life of Riley for at least a week before being detected and expelled.
Internet security experts announced that more than 83% of the bad spelling on the World-Wide Web occurs in proximity to photographs of cats. No satisfactory explanation has been offered for this phenomenon, but susceptible individuals are warned to look up pictures of flowers or something instead.
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ASK DR. BOLI.
Dear Dr. Boli: Yesterday afternoon, as I was out driving in the suburbs, I passed a church with one of those slogan boards where the inspirational phrase of the week can be spelled out in plastic letters. This was the slogan on the sign:
JESUS CAN SAVIOR SOUL
I have been worrying about this sign ever since. I thought I knew how the English language worked, but I expect an infinitive without the particle to after the verb can, and instead all I got was two substantives in a row. What does it mean? Has the English language evolved so quickly that it is now unintelligible to a woman of my generation? (Without divulging my exact age, I may mention that I was born as long ago as the Reagan administration.) Am I doomed to sit in sullen silence now while others banter in what I thought was my native language? —Sincerely, A Woman of a Certain Age.
Dear Madam: You are the victim of what is known as a pun, a sort of linguistic diversion in which words of an identical or similar sound are substituted for the words you expect, with the intent of producing a humorous effect. In order to understand the intended meaning, you must pronounce the words aloud, or at least hear them with the ears of your mind (so to speak), and then think of similar words that will convey a more intelligible meaning.
The pun is merely a tool in the writer’s linguistic tool caddy, and like any tool it can be used for constructive or destructive purposes. William Shakespeare, Sydney Smith, Dorothy Parker, Groucho Marx, and James Joyce all made a high art of the pun. Unfortunately, although members of the clergy are frequently addicted to the practice of punning, even the rudiments of the art seem not to be taught in our seminaries. For a pun to have any humorous effect, it is necessary for the substituted words to have a meaning on their own, and one that contrasts with, but at the same time illuminates, the meaning of the original phrase. This is the principle that eludes the punning clergy.
Can nothing be done about these offensively meaningless clerical puns? It is probably pointless to protest to the minister or priest who authorized the sign; you would only be told “I thought it was rather funny,” and against such profound ignorance of literary art there is no argument. There are, however, larger organizations that supervise the activities of some of the clergy, and you may be able to appeal to the diocese, presbytery, synod, or conference to which this particular church belongs. If the church belongs to one of the disorganized evangelical sects, however, little will be accomplished by a formal protest, and your only recourse may be cautious vandalism.
COMMUNITY BULLETIN BOARD.
A COMMUNITY MEETING will be held inside the Food Carnival supermarket on Bland Street on April 6 at 7 p.m. State Senator Wilmot Redshank will introduce the community to his new in-store SenatExpress office next to the deli counter.
The neighborhood Christmas decorations are still up along Bland Street, but they will be removed forthwith if someone will be kind enough to lend us a ladder. The old one finally rusted through.
The Blandville Branch Library will be holding its annual Giant Book Sale beginning April 3. This year’s book is positively enormous, so don’t miss this once-a-year event!
State budget cuts have forced the Port Authority to reduce the frequency of Red Line streetcars. The Port Authority is confident that these reductions are only temporary, but for the duration, when you go to work in the morning, would you consider letting someone sit on your lap?
St. Barnabas Lutheran Church will be dedicating its new electronic synthesizer at the Saturday folk service on April 2 at 7 p.m. If you know any good prayers for audio equipment, Pastor Hamilton would love to hear from you!
Road works are scheduled on Bland Street all next week. On Monday, striping work will close one lane. On Tuesday, the entire street will be closed for repaving. On Friday, Consolidated Gas will be digging a new main.
Do you have undiscovered literary talent? The Community Bulletin Board is looking for a new editor. If you can spell well and are familiar with the works of the nineteenth-century Transcendentalists, leave us a message and we’ll get back to you.
OBITUARY.
MR. LI CHEUNG, the Hong Kong film star, has died of a surfeit of beets, his publicist has announced. Mr. Li was most famous for his series of martial-arts movies in the 1970s featuring the traditional Chinese practice of Tai Chi. His most successful film, Enter the Lotus, is widely regarded as a classic of the genre. Its four-and-a-half-hour climactic fight scene is still considered the fastest-paced Tai Chi battle ever filmed. Mr. Li was 135 years old. He is survived by his 35 children, 137 grandchildren, 648 great-grandchildren, and 1,751 great-great grandchildren, and by his father, who was his first Tai Chi instructor.
ASK DR. BOLI.
Dear Dr. Boli: I am confused as to why there is a summer spice deodorant but not a winter spice. Am I doomed to stink the whole winter season? —Sincerely, Nathan.
Dear Sir: Your mistake is in contemplating the use of an artificial “deodorant” in the first place. A deodorant with a scent of any sort is a contradiction in terms, and no good can come of it. If it were truly a deodorant, would it not eliminate odors? How, then, would any scent of “summer spice,” or winter spice, or vernal or autumnal spice, remain? Clearly you are a victim of consumer fraud.
Instead of wasting your money on quack remedies, Dr. Boli suggests that a course of rigorous training is what you need. In his 227½ years on this earth, Dr. Boli has learned that the mind controls the body to a degree unimagined by most younger and less disciplined men, and in particular the odors you produce are largely under your own control. Dr. Boli, for example, prefers to emit just the faintest hint of orange blossoms when in mixed company. Practice night and day until you have the knack; it will soon become second nature to you.
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Dear Dr. Boli: Every time I go to the market, I see a sign: “Caution Automatic Door.” I’ve cautioned these doors for many months now—but my warnings are ignored. Is there some special danger these doors face? —Sincerely John M.
Dear Sir: You do not give yourself enough credit. The gossip columns and police blotters are full of the activities of automatic doors that have been indiscreet or worse, and yet the doors you mention have been quietly doing their job for as long as you have been warning them. Doubtless the opportunity has arisen many times to slam shut on some young woman’s skirt and have an ill-natured laugh at her expense, or to refuse to open when the manager comes in at 8:30. But whenever those occasions present themselves, the doors call to mind your cautions, and the cautions of the countless other anonymous good citizens who have taken the trouble to follow the instructions on the sign. Who can say what trouble those doors might be in at this very moment, were it not for your timely admonitions, delivered regularly and always in a spirit of charity? Well done, sir. And since you have shown evidence of such exemplary public-spiritedness, Dr. Boli ventures to suggest another field in which your endeavors might prove valuable. Do you think you might be able to do something about the slow children on Bland Street? The sign warning that they are just ahead has been there for years now. Obviously they must pose a danger to vehicular traffic, or there would be no sign. Can nothing be done to disperse them?
ANNOUNCEMENT.
ARE YOU READY to introduce your children to gnostic theology, but still looking for educational materials that will compete with popular entertainment for the attention of their addled little brains? The new four-color comic book from the Gnostic Tract Society is just what you’ve been looking for. The Adventures of Achamoth Outside the Pleroma is a rip-roaring tale of enlightenment suitable for children from 6 to 14. You will be surprised how well the comic book, as a literary genre, adapts to the expression of gnostic theological principles. Send for your free copy today. Gnostic Tract Society, Point Breeze.
QUAERITUR.
FINAL UPDATE: This site vanished when the host claimed it used too much bandwidth (up to two dozen visitors a day) and wanted money.
WHY DO PEOPLE fill the Web with useless little sites that contribute nothing to the education of the masses? This is a useless and senseless question, since there is no reasonable answer to it, and even if it could be answered, nothing further could be done. Now, at last, comes a useless little site to honor the useless and senseless questions that have no reasonable answers:
QUAERITUR
—which is Latin for “it is asked,” a word much beloved of lawyers, since, by obviating the necessity of specifying who is asking, it avoids the perils of assigning responsibility. The site’s sole purpose is to entertain you, and its appearance at this moment has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that Dr. Boli was experimenting with a new publishing program.