Sunday, June 1, 2008

Hostilities Delayed Due To Small Typeface

“This Is Spinal Tap” is one of my favorite movies. In fact, it should be one of your favorite movies. It is incumbent upon every single one of us to say "Hello Cleveland" every time that we get lost at any point in time (because it's not like we're stopping to ask for directions).

Along with that, every one of us should be able to picture the bewilderment in Nigel Tufnel’s and David St. Hubbins’ eyes when performing "Stonehenge." Their confusion was driven by seeing an 18 inch stone replica descending to the stage when they were expecting an 18 foot replica. Or as David St. Hubbins put it, the concern that, “There was a Stonehenge monument on the stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf.”

If you can picture their bewildered look in your eyes, then you can picture me this past Christmas.

The wife was doing some shopping on Amazon at the end of last year and asked me if I wanted anything, particularly for the upcoming Holidays. I had never read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. Deciding that peace and harmony sucks, I thought it would be a good gift idea. I searched for the book and found an amazingly low price. That made it an even better gift idea and so I ordered it.

Our Amazon order arrived later in December. Too late for a Hanukah gift that year, but fine for Christmas. Kelly absconded with the package once it arrived. Later, I asked her if she was going to wrap the present up and put it under the tree. She told me I would get it as a stocking stuffer. I thought that was a little odd to cram my book into my stocking. But what did I know, after all, I’m Jewish. I don’t question these Christmas things.

Christmas came. Our family gathered to open presents and see what Santa had brought us in our stockings. And much to my bewilderment, he had brought me this.


Somehow, I had angered Santa and he had shrunk my book on war.

One day, I’m going to update my reading glasses prescription. And at that point, I could become a very dangerous man.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

What did you expect? Sun Tzu wrote the book. The book is short. Sun Tzu is Chinese. Chinese people are short.

Nothing surprising there Costanza.