Thursday, May 05, 2005

Honey, Alan often tells me, should only be eaten if it comes from a bear shaped bottle. I used to agree with him whole-heartedly. But now I'm not so sure. What started out as an innocuous obsession has since populated our room with an ever expanding family of clover honey bears.

It all started one month ago, among the newly-stocked shelves of our school's on-site convenience store. Alan saw the bear. The bear saw Alan. It told him to liberate it from the shelf. The bear's allure - it's luscious plastic finish, it's glistening contents - was too powerful to disobey.

So we took it home. And the next day, we obtained another. And the next day, another. And another. And another. And then, while shopping at Schnuck's, Alan decided to diversify his honey-bear population and bought a jar of wildflower honey (with a bear on the label). We collected them all on the desk, so he could admire their permanent expressions of content.

Yesterday, our friend M-. payed Alan and I an extremely intoxicated visit. After about an hour of our company, M-. received a phone call:

M-.: Hey dude, what's up. . . . Oh yeah? Sounds good. Can I bring a friend or two? . . . (turns to Alan) You wanna come to some guy's backyard to drink beer?

Alan: No, not tonight. Larkin and I have a shit-ton of work to do. I've got a paper due Thursday.

M-.: (addresses telephone) Looks like it's just me coming over . . . yeah . . . yeah. . . . dude, hang on one second. (turns to Alan) DUDE. Is that all honey?

Alan: Yeah, man. Of course.

M-.: (shakes head) That's a lot of fuckin' honey!

Alan: You bet.

I just know M-. will wonder why we had seven bottles of honey for the rest of his life.

shiny objects