bedroom a distant prospect lord berners bathroom big fish daniel wallace car/walk waltzing the cat pam houston
office resigned .|. free-for-all michael penn car you've come a long way, baby fatboy slim .|. trainspotting soundtrack living room apple venus volume 1 xtc
brand x the message came from out of the blue: Brand X welcomes you into its clutches.
1999 april 13
riddle me this
we arrived home much later than i would have liked last night.
i have to be at the office early so hopefully i will find a few minutes to update this a little later...
...okay, it's more than a little later, but nonetheless, it's still the 13th.
as we were on the last leg of our journey home last night, both gene and i were flagging a bit and finding strange and amusing ways to stay awake. for about an hour it was gene singing at the top of his lungs, songs everyone knows but with gene's own special lyrics. it did an admirable job of keeping me alert but after that hour i asked him to stop as both my face and my stomach hurt from laughing so hard.
"okay then," he said, "let's play riddle games. a man lives on the 14th floor and each morning he takes the elevator down to the lobby and each evening he walks up 14 flights of stairs. why?"
"i dunno. why?"
"no, you have to ask questions."
"what?"
"you know, ask questions so you can figure it out."
"oh. does the elevator have a timer?"
"no."
"does he have to carry home something huge like an elephant every night?"
"no."
"okay, i dunno. why?"
"no, no, no, you can't just give up you have to keep asking questions."
"no, i don't. there is no good reason why someone would walk up 14 flights of stairs every night."
"yes, there is. c'mon, ask another."
"what color is his hair?"
"doesn't matter."
"what does he do for a living?"
"doesn't matter."
"does he love his mother?"
"of course. but it doesn't matter."
"okay, i give up."
"no, ask more questions."
"no. all you say is doesn't matter and i already told you, there is no good reason for it. if you had said the 16th floor or the 12th, i might have some curiosity but you said 14th and as i work on the 14th floor i know there is absolutely no way i would be walking up those stairs everyday, unless it was for exercise. he's not fat and in need of exercise is he?"
"nope."
"okay, then i give."
there ensued a rapid fire discussion about whether i wanted to know more than he wanted to tell or he wanted to tell more than i wanted to know and after much back and forth and giggling and accusing and general silliness, gene blurted out, "he's a midget! that's why!! he can't reach the button for the 14th floor!"
"he's a moron you mean, a midget moron! geez, if you had to climb 14 flights of stairs with your ultrashort little legs wouldn't you remember to bring a bloody stick next time to poke the bloody button with? wouldn't you learn how to jump? to coerce someone into pushing the button? what a maroon! i should have asked if he were an idiot instead of his hair color."
"no doubt. i mean at the very least he could have pressed the button for six and only walked eight flights."
"besides, that's not a riddle, that's a guessing game. you misled me."
"no i didn't."
"yes, you did. a riddle is like what's black and white and red all over?"
gene raised an eyebrow.
"a nun watching deep throat."
"a what?"
i ignored him. "what's green and goes 90 miles an hour? a frog in a blender. what do you call a guy with no arms and no legs on a porch? matt. on the beach? sandy. in the water? bob. my absolute all time favorite: what do you do with a dog with no legs? take him for a drag."
[synchronicity aside--
i just checked my email and found this riddle in it:Q-- where do you find a dog with no legs?it's a damn good thing we didn't sit next to each other in grade school, we'd both have been sent to the headmaster's for our uncontrollable giggling over all the poor limbless canines in the world.
A-- right where you left it.
--end aside]
giggling so much her officemate looks nervous, claire
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