Re: My Original Sentence from Jake Euker

Just recently, I attended a yard sale put on by a number of people, including local eccentric and artist, Jake Euker.  At this yard sale, Jake was selling original sentences for .50 each.  I bought three: one for me, one for a neighbor, and one as a birthday gift for my sister-in-law.  My sentence came in a Nascar-themed envelope which read "We just absolutely pity any dumb bastard who is too stupid and conceited to buy this sentence," was written on a Nascar car-shaped notecard, and said, "I'm made up all of Jello," Mama said, "and Toofy's made up all of Jello, too."

The card had an 11-legged sun figure (white) floating free and 3 green, white, and black skull stickers adhered to the inside.

Here is my imagination gone wild with that original sentence:

"I'm made up all of Jello," Mama said, "and Toofy's made up all of Jello, too."

"And what did you expect, after all that lemonade and water you drank today?" Papa replied, setting down his can of BudLight long enough to light a cigarette.


Neither of them thought it strange that my sister and I'd had only raw hot dogs and ice cream for breakfast, nor did they warn us to wait an hour before we played on the Slip-'n-Slide Pa had haphazardly lain across our 1/16 acre of a backyard.  Fortunately, the yard didn't have many rocks, but just last year, Toofy'd run inside crying after stepping on an especially sharp one while playing hide-and-go-seek.  Mom put some of her special formula on her knee, a rainbow-colored Band-aid, and told Toof to "Run along, now.  Mom and Dad are busy."  So it was most summer days; Toof and I would entertain ourselves while Ma made cocktails and watched TV and Pa typed away on his "great American novel."


"You always say we should stay hydrated," I remind my Pa, rolling my eyes exaggeratedly, "but it's no fun sliding on a belly full of water." 


"Sit in the sun," Pa said.  "You'll sweat it off soon enough."


And he was right.  Today was the hottest day of summer yet - 107, and it wasn't even 2:00 pm.  On day's as hot as these, the window unit in the TV room did little to cool the house enough to play inside.  Besides, a kid can only watch so many "Fresh Prince of Bel-Aire" re-runs before wondering what's going out outside; has the sprinkler reached Mrs. White's fence and her beloved rose bush yet?  Was the stray cat in the yard?  And how many froglings had happened upon the rapidly growing puddle next to the hose since the valve leaks?  Toof and I never went two consecutive hours inside; we were young and wild, and we defied the Newscaster's warning to stay inside to avoid heat-stroke.  Heat-stroke was something foreign, like foie-gras or paella, and only happened to, like, old people in upper-level apartment buildings in the 1980s.  And me and Toofer live in Central Kansas in 2011.