That Old Wooden Box your Great Aunt Gave you has a Peculiar History
A Woodchopper, Elves and Nords conspire to make a custom box
I came across an old wooden box recently. Tucked inside was this warranty:
About Your New Hold /Everything Dresser Box…
Congratulations! You are now the proud owner(s) of the Hold/Everything Dresser Box specifically designed for those men who like to extricate the contents of their pockets into something before flinging their pants in the corner. This box has been handcrafted by small, wizened, ugly, ill-tempered gnomes in a far-off land known as Lake Zurich. Their grumbling can be heard as they muddle through the day struggling to overcome the effects of their overindulgence of their legendary beer brewed from the sweat of wart hogs and the essence of pole cats. Grudgingly, their pudgy, gnarled hands whittle away at the dense wood, eventually completing the boxes at the rate of one every 16 weeks. Although slow, occasionally they turn out a good one. Unfortunately for you, this is not one of the good ones.
The wood is walnut from another far-off land known as Arlington Heights. “One two, one two, his vorpal blade went snicker-snack.* The walnut tree was hacked down by a grizzled old wood chopper, Ebenezer Elderhornwors, and his faithful dog, Stubs. Although loyal, the playful Stubs was somewhat stupid, often frolicking too close to the razor-sharp double-edged axe as it arced toward the tree. Hence the nickname stubs. The old walnut tree had stood for 74 years and Alvina Elderhornwors, the pleasant, blue-haired, matronly wife of the wood chopper, had made walnut cakes from the tree for 60 of those years. (Of course, she didn’t have blue hair when she first started making walnut cakes; rather, her hair was the color of the fruit she harvested. (Ed. note: Time marches on.) However, after Alvina’s father, Eldon Worstenhopper had been hung by the neck until dead from one of the tree’s stouter lower twisted branches, by a roving band of renegade pixies, for ill-advisedly pissing on a stand of wild daffodils, Alvina tearfully told her husband to fell the old tree. “Cut the son-of-a-bitch down,” she wailed.
The finish of your new Hold/Everything Dresser Box was formulated in yet another far-off land known as Schaumburg. The Nordic Oil Finish is non-toxic and contains Tung Oil. The Tung Oil is collected by stealthy elves using small little containers made from acorns. Elves hunt down and trap the elusive Nords and hold them down with their tiny pointed feet as the wring the Nords little tongues. The bleating from the unhappy Nords can be heard ringing throughout the enchanted forest as the Tung Oil is wrenched from their little scruffy tongues. Usually, after the Tung Oil is harvested, the small Nords quickly recover and scurry away into the brush. However, occasionally, one of the oafish stouter elves , who has stuffed away too many magic mushrooms, over-enthusiastically applies exorbitant foot pressure thereby squashing the hapless Nord into a lilliputian puddle of fur. “Oh shit!” is often the comment the stout elf will make.
After this story, the manufacturer is sure you will understand why no guarantees or warranties, either expressed or implied, are offered with this product. It may last for generations, or it may last until the owner flings the box across the room in a “rit of fage!” and decimates the word of the gnomes, the woodcutter and the elves, and…let’s not forget the Nords, as the box splinters into small little (Ed. Note: Redundancy intentional) insignificant pieces.
You can formulate your own moral to this story.
· Lewis Carroll, Jaberwocky, Through the Looking Glass
· ** Inspector Clousseau, The Pink Panther
