Backbone > Quarter to Three
Piano Banana
illustration by Thomas McDonough

Movie-Hating Dog
My cousin Andy writes:
“My dog hates movies.
I don’t know why.
She doesn’t mind TV,
but as soon as I put
a video in the VCR
she begins to cry.
She will whimper
through the entire movie.
I have to lock her in
the bathroom.
The only movies
she likes star Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Those she will
actually watch.”

Piano Banana
The Zoroastrian seer Paran
Torravi once asked his student Narr,
“Have you ever peeled a banana and found a piano inside?”
“No, that is impossible,” Narr responded.
“Then peel this,” Torravi said, handing Narr a banana.
Narr removed the peel to discover a piano.
“How did you do that?” Narr asked.
“I did nothing. I have no talents,” Torravi answered.
“Then how did the piano get inside the banana?” Narr demanded.
“Why are you asking me?” replied Torravi.

Gum Altar
The altar of the church of San Sebastian in Irapuelto, Mexico, is composed of small pieces of tree resin that have been individually chewed, then allowed to harden. The effect is like a huge orange half-melted candle. This is believed to be the only altar literally made of chewing gum.

Anarcho-Gymnasts
In 1911, the Federation of European Gymnasts was 30 percent anarchist. In Italy and Spain, almost every gymnast espoused an anti-state philosophy. The black flag flew proudly at competitions, sometimes beside the national flag. In 1912, gymnasts in Toulouse, France created a spectacle entitled “The Death of Capitalism and the Flowering of Human Will,” which toured the Continent and Northern Africa for two years. World War I effectively ended the anarchist influence in sports.

Emmy,
I am on the bus, to Margaretville.
Three ducks fly away from me, low over Compton Lake, in Lake Hill.
I see their asses in flight. Someone has unrolled half the toilet paper roll, in the bus bathroom;
the paper lies in a heap on the floor. It looks (a little) like the toilet paper roll has been weeping.

French Proverb:
“All women are surprised to grow old; all men are surprised to die.”

My water bottle is named “Crystal Geyser Alpine Spring Water,”
yet is from Tennessee. Doesn’t “Alpine” mean “of the Alps”?
[Note: Now it is the next day. I have consulted the dictionary.] “Alpine - of, resembling, or relating to the
Alps or any mountains.”(And “alpinism” is not a religion; it is simply mountain climbing.)

Do you know what happened to my friend Deb?
(Probably not.) She took off her coat at the Salvation Army, looked around the room, and when she was ready to leave, her coat was missing. They had sold it
(with all her keys inside)!

Irish confetti - a rock, brick, or piece of rock (or brick)
used as a missile.

“Grecize” and “Grecianize” are synonyms!
(Both mean “to make Greek.”)

Love, Sparrow

Definition
Organic chair - A chair built of wood, bamboo, or any plant grown without fertilizers. Nails are made of pure iron.
Any paint or varnish is non-toxic.

Journal Entry
This morning I found a daddy longlegs
clutching onto my pasta strainer.
Bill Nye said: “Wagner’s music is much better than it sounds.”

A Quote
“The mind is like a piano with 800,000 keys.”
—Bertrand Russell

Song
An old lamber
Climbs a hill,
Rings a bell.

Marla, Marla,
He calls,
To the grass
And sky.

[Note: lamber - keeper of lambs]

Cliff,
I see inadvertent flag humor. On a symmetric porch in Kingston, two flags hang, on either side of the door. The one on the right is considerably smaller than the one on the left, as if the owner is saying: “The left side of my porch is more patriotic than the right side.”Another flag, south of Kingston, hangs by two pegs, but the upper edge is not straight. It droops; this flag looks drunk. And the flag in the window of the Salvation Army is old, of course.

I never knew flags could erode, before this recent era. Those on cars dissolve, from the outside in. The entire American road system must be spotted with tiny red and white threads. (I have never seen the erosion reach a flag’s blue field.)

The Best Pet
The best pet is a mouse. It requires no feeding,
or any care whatsoever. Mice are quiet, gentle, and cute.
They accommodate other pets well (though many cats
are averse to them). You do not even have to purchase one.
Mice will come to you. And if you do not murder them, they will stay. Their only drawback is that they spread diseases, but contracting one of these diseases is extremely rare. Your entire effort as a mouse owner is to clean up their shit (if you choose). They cannot, to my understanding, be housebroken.

Did you see the article in the New York Times claiming that the Koran has been mistranslated? Some new scholar insists that you do not meet virgins in Paradise but “silver raisins.” This sounds like a joke,
but it was recently on the front page.

Presently, Sparrow