There Is Something You Must Hear

The major conversation topic this week was Tuesday’s earthquake. Everybody was an expert. Everybody wanted to know where you were, what you were doing, what you were thinking, what you were feeling. The opinions expressed here may not be my own. I just heard them.


Uncle Willie was at a funeral for his former boss, Mr. Ralph Lawrence. Uncle Willie did not like Mr. Lawrence but went out of respect and to make sure that it was indeed Mr. Ralph Lawrence in the casket. Well, all the chemicals and the draining of blood did something to Mr. Lawrence who on his best day was very, very hard on everybody’s eyes. Uncle Willie always wore sunglasses or closed his eyes tightly when Mr. Lawrence was around. Well just as the casket was to be lowered into the ground that’s when the ground started shaking, the trees started shimmying, the flowers started swaying, some of the car alarms started making noise. Well, all the shaking woke up Mr. Lawrence who opened his casket and said “Hello.” Luckily the doctor was there and said that was just an involuntary muscle reflex as he closed the casket.

Uncle Peter felt his living room shake violently while he was watching something about the pre-season and then he automatically ran out of the house because his new wife Melanie Louise can not cook, she has blown up two stoves, one grill, one refrigerator, and his car.

Cousin Ethel was at work talking about the latest jobless figures. She has an interior office. She has high blood pressure. Well on Tuesday she ate all the wrong foods intentionally and at first she thought that she was having a bad case of indigestion, then a heart attack.

Jasper and Cordelia were having lunch in some downtown restaurant. Jasper was complaining about the waiter and the President. Cordelia was texting her daughter Miranda who was upset because her current boyfriend had not proposed yet. The plates started rattling, the walls started swaying. Jasper was unamused and thought that it was a trick to get more tip money. Cordelia didn’t know what to think and kept texting her daughter. All of the white people and Asian people scream and leave the restaurant. Jasper and Cordelia look around and with great dignity leave the restaurant. Jasper muttered something under his breath.