Sunday, February 13, 2005

A Bedtime Story by my brother Edd

My late brother was an enormous influence on me--my first drunk, first sacreligious joke, you know--big brother stuff. He composed this story (to the best of my knowledge) as a treat to me at age 9.
The Twenty-nine Schwartz Brothers
Once upon a time, there were 29 Schwartz brothers: Jamie, the eldest, followed in line by Murray, Erik, Stavros and Chuck (twins),Renee, Joey, Pietre, Armando, Sergio, Vlad, Amamchukwu, Wang, Hans,Bobby, Xavier, Sean, Blake, Ruben,Oscar, Arthur, George, Pinky, Don,Omar,Vespasian,Boris, Trevor, and Hershell. All of the Schwartz brothers enjoyed a clear, satin like complexion--except for baby brother Hershell. He had warts. Warts on top of warts--it was hard to see him for all the warts. Naturally, his brothers were very concerned, so they fed him dinner, gave him a bath, and put him to bed, vowing to take him to the doctor straight away in the morning.
The next day, bright and early, they dressed Hershell in his best clothes and took him to the family doctor.
"Doctor", said Jamie, the eldest and therefor spokes brother, "our brother is a mass of warts. What can we do?"
"Well,"replied the doc, "you're going to have to cut his head off."
"NO!" exclaimed the brothers, and took Hershell home, where they fed him dinner, gave him a bath, and put him to bed.
This went on for several days--each day a new, better wart specialist, every day the opinion in favor of decapitation, and the subsequent dinner/bath/bed.
Finally, they came upon the worlds most impressive and intimidating expert on warts.
"Doctor", said Jamie, "we've seen every wart doctor in the known world, barring yourself. They all tell us we have to cut our brother's head off. We don't want to do that. Please, Doctor, tell us we won't have to do that!"
The doctor looked Hershell over carefully--looked in both ears, tested his reflexes, listened to his heart beat, and finally smiled.
"Doctor! Tell us! Will we have to cut our brother's head off or not?"
"Absolutely NOT," replied the doctor, "from the look of it, in another day or so it should just DROP off."
The End