Some days I can't help myself. The inappropriateness leaks out of me like boiling pasta water through a colander. Perhaps it is not socially acceptable to compare abandoned books to abandoned babies. To those who follow such tenets, let me just say this: "Why are you such antibibliophiles?" Can you not love books in the way philanthropists love juvenile mankind chillin' in baskets on porches throughout the world?
This book-abandoning behavior is getting out of hand! Just today, a book was left in my classroom after the final bell. My canaries were singing again, though. "Mrs. Thevictorian! Somebody has left their book on that desk!" Let the record show that it was not MY textbook, but that of another course. However...the leaver was one who has already lost MY textbook, and uses that of a trusting friend each day because I will not issue another until the first is paid for. "Do you want me to yell down the hall, Mrs. Thevictorian, and tell that leaver to come get the book?"
"Yes. By all means. I'm headed out to duty." I passed The Leaver in the hall. "Oh, I see you're going back to rescue THAT book! It's too late for mine. Perhaps you're learning responsibility." We shall see.
So all this book-abandoning has me firing up efforts to get my proposed handbasket factory off the ground. I have the most scathingly brilliant idea! A handbasket book about handbaskets! A little pocket book that you can read while you're actually in your handbasket. And it will be all about the history of the handbasket!
I don't know where I cooked up that idea. Sometimes I simply amaze myself with my originality. Say...maybe the book can be shaped like an actual handbasket!
See you later. I've got to clear some space on the counter of my proposed handbasket factory. I'm getting quite a line of products on there.
A hand basket book about hand baskets! That is a terrific idea. I'll bet you could have them produced by Kramerico Industries.
ReplyDeleteAND you can put the book on handbaskets on a coffee table. OR put it on top of a book (shaped like coffee tables) about coffee tables.
ReplyDeleteAnd then you can be on Regis and Kathie Lee. And spit coffee on Kathie Lee!
ReplyDeleteI don't know. Those who are already in their handbasket have a destination in mind that doesn't promote much reading and after arrival--paper may not do well. I'd suggest printing your book on asbestos but that material has been declared harmful--not that it would matter in the final location.
ReplyDeleteIf Seinfeld's Kramer can make a coffee table book shaped like a coffee table, I see no reason why you can't make a hand basket book shaped like a hand basket.
ReplyDeletejoeh,
ReplyDeleteI'm sure Kramer's intern could handle the job.
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Sioux,
Maybe I could stumble upon Salmon Rushdie, or "Sal Bass," in the sauna, and get him to endorse it.
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Birdie,
Yes, I could hobnob with celebrities. But hopefully neither I, nor my friend who looks like Humpty Dumpty with a melon head, would ever break Bette Midler's leg in a softball game.
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Leenie,
Well, that's the point. To take their mind off the destination while they're reading the handbasket book. They can dwell on the craftsmanship and history of a designer handbasket.
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Stephen,
Wait! Did he copy me? It's like he went into the future at his December 31st, 2000 Millennium Party!