Out by Feargal Lawlor’s!

Down by the pump near Mixie’s Well!

Round by the broken crannóg at Loughool!

There it goes—the Ballybothar Road!

I have food poisoning.
My car broke down.
My brother messed up the printer.
I didn’t read the story.
I didn’t get the story.
I hated the story.

Odd how a small thing can stir a huge memory. One Saturday morning, on NPR’s “It’s Only a Game,” the talk had turned to the versatility of a noted sports writer, who was not, said commentator Glenn Stout, “just a one-note pony.” My body jacked bolt upright in its recliner, my Ovaltine sloshed into my lap, and my mind barely choked off an expletive so crude that it is now commonly reserved for strolling gangs of teenage girls. One Note Pony? Who in the name of Gypsy Rose Lee would possibly remember!

Tuneful ponies are, of course, rare, and nowadays seldom noticed.

The University wasn’t too impressed that I had taught the monkey to speak. No matter what I did, they always required more.

I knew that when I taught Chester to clean my office, put away my books, sweep up the cookie crumbs, and make neat piles of paper on my desk, it wasn’t going to impress the department. But I couldn’t lose with that, so I considered it my first success, regardless.

Everyone knows about the history of Ham Sandwich, left unconsumed in the department break room on the afternoon of December 12th when its then owner, Dr. Perry Birmbo, decided to go out to lunch with colleagues. As most know, the deli-sliced, pumpernickel housed entrée—whose genius had until then gone entirely unnoticed—went on to receive its Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from Yale in 1960. From its beginning as part of the incoming class of ’54, the sandwich defied all expectations by becoming the John Newsmith Fellow in ’56, the winner of the third-year teaching award in ’59, and the recipient of the Dana D. Hampsted Prize for the best dissertation by a non-eating member since Mary Veneble’s teacup had stolen the show in 1892. The rest, involving the mounting accusations of anti-Semitism that led to the “Bad Air Affair” and Sandwich’s subsequent precipitous plummet from public grace in the recent months, is popular knowledge.