Posts by Dr. Boli
NOTICE.
GENEROUS REWARD OFFERED for return of manila file folder with county arms on cover accidentally left on a Red Line trolley car in the Wood Street subway station at about 9:35 this morning. The folder contains dull and thoroughly uninteresting court paperwork that would in no way be embarrassing to prothonotary James Polk Brenneman if the contents were revealed on Wikileaks, so any members of the public who come across this folder are advised not even to open it, because honestly you’d just be bored stiff. The word “kickbacks” on the tab is a technical legal term in Commonwealth law referring to certain mundane procedures that are of no interest whatsoever to anyone outside the county court system. Also, the reward offered is exceedingly generous.
From DR. BOLI’S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF MISINFORMATION.
Peachtree Street in 1907, looking toward the intersection with Peachtree Street.
Atlanta. In antebellum Atlanta, every street was named Peachtree Street, giving the plan of the city a pleasing uniformity. The addition of several streets not named Peachtree, imposed on the city by the occupying forces after the Civil War, is still a sore point among old-timers.
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CLARIFICATION.
IN VIEW OF the unseemly hullabaloo in the press, the Liberty Valley School Board would like to clarify that the district-wide ban on mentioning the name of George Washington in history classes is not meant to disparage his admirers in any way, but merely to encourage sensitivity to the feelings of Tory families in the area.
CELEBRITY GOSSIP.
THE WELL-KNOWN but secretive East-End restauranteur Peter Piper was seen yesterday at Stamoolis Brothers in the Strip carefully selecting a quarter-bushel of peppers preserved in vinegar.
From DR. BOLI’S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF MISINFORMATION.
Horses. Horses were originally bred from centaurs, which in their primitive form are swift and strong, but notoriously unsuitable as mounts. Ancient breeders wisely concentrated on improving the head, since the human head is, on the centaur as on the human being, the most useless part of the creature.
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DR. BOLI’S ALLEGORICAL BESTIARY.
No. 23.—The Gryphon.
THE GRYPHON, OR griffon, or griffin, or γρύφων, is a creature with the head of an eagle and the body of a lion; which means, by inevitable natural symmetry, that somewhere in this wide world there is a creature with the head of a lion and the body of an eagle, and wherever it is Dr. Boli would recommend staying out of its way.
As birds (or mammals) of prey, gryphons are forced to spend much of their time hunting. Their unusual metabolism compels them to restrict their diet to other portmanteau beasts, such as sphinxes, or basilisks, or chimeras. It is not as easy to find a chimera as you might think, and gryphons are commonly hungry, which makes them not a little irascible; it is therefore vitally important, if you should meet a gryphon, that you should not irasce him. Otherwise, gryphons are generally harmless, and useful in keeping down excessive populations of satyrs and other pests. If you find gryphons roosting in your attic, you may be assured that they are earning their room and board by keeping your house free from minotaurs.
Allegorically, the gryphon represents the frozen-succotash industry, succotash being another monstrous hybrid.
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ASK DR. BOLI.
Dear Dr. Boli: Yesterday on Murray Avenue I parked behind a Japanese car that identified itself as a “PZEV,” which was spelled out in smaller letters as “Partial Zero Emissions Vehicle.” What does that mean? I haven’t been able to sleep since I saw it. —Sincerely, William C. Ford, Jr.
Dear Sir: You are right to be concerned, and your sleeplessness is indicative of a proper regard for the laws of mathematics. In their quest to squeeze ever more power out of a drop of oil, and to find a way to burn odoriferous chemicals without causing odoriferous smoke, automobile manufacturers have resorted to many a shady trick; but dividing zero into parts crosses the line from fraudulent to outright dangerous. There is no knowing what such a frontal assault on the foundations of arithmetic will lead to. If the rumors that General Motors has been selling unmarked Zero-Dividend Vehicles in the United States prove true, Dr. Boli trembles for the order of the universe.