THE WHINN Y BAGO Eugene's dusty pick up rolled into Fred's yard, the bed piled high with brush. Leaves, twigs and entire branches trickled ¢ on the road behind it. "Got anything to go to the dump, Fred?", Eugene called through the drivers window. "I'm on my way right now. Could save you a trip." "You don't have room for a matchbox, Eugene", replied Fred. "Maybe you'll have lots of room by the time you get there, what with your load spilling all over, but right now 1 don't see any room." "Put it in the cab with me!" "OK, Eugene. I got a bag of fish guts in the can here, been here since I got a mess of pike day before yesterday. They're stinking up the shed, and the coons are trying to beat down the door to get at 'em." Eugene's nose wrinkled in distaste. "Forget it, Fred. I thought that ripe smell was coming off of you. You'll notice I didn't invite you into the truck. Anyways, I really stopped by to find out about your vacation down South. Was the trailer you rented in Kingston as good as they promised?" "Oh, it was some kind of a luxurious thing. It was a Whinny Bago with a bedroom, kitchen, living room, bath and shower. All compact and neat. It was some kind of outfit." "So you had a good time mn Florida?" "Not so you'd notice, no. It would have been fine if it was just Muriel and me, but she had to go and talk her mother into traveling with us. I tell you, her mother and me in a trailer is like a badger and a pit bull sharing a cage. For a little wee woman she's some surly. The thing is, she's the World-Wide Head of the Pleasure Police. If it tastes good, feels good, or is liable to be fun she'll against it. She's a bag of bones crammed full of bad opinions. She's thin because she won't eat anything that tastes good. She's big on parsnips and root vegetables, but try to barbeque a steak and she'll talk your ear off about cholesterol and how you'll get cancer from charring the meat. "She won't watch TV because it will turn your brain to oatmeal, and she won't sleep because indolence is driving the nation to ruin. That leaves her alert, awake, and with nothing to do but be a giant pain in the butt. It was a nightmare. But let me tell you the worst." Eugene turned the key, shutting off the engine in the pick up. "Fred, now I know why I stop here whenever I can. You brighten up my whole life just by showing me the darker side. Tell me the worst." "Well, we were getting ready to leave for home, and after breakfast I drove to a gas station to fill up the Whinny Bago for the trip home. That's when the old lady discovered she didn't have her wedding ring. She looked all around and declared she must have lost it in the shower. I'm surprised when old Ralph was alive he didn't rip it off her finger and throw it in the lake. "These trailers have holding tanks you know, one for gray water and a separate one for sewage. If she lost her ring in the shower, I calculated it should be in the gray water tank. Underneath the trailer there's a pipe, and you turn a valve, one for the gray water and one for the sewage. See, you're supposed to hook up the pipe to something to pump out the tanks. I didn't know that. There's lots about that trailer I didn't know. "So we're sitting in the gas station, waiting in line, and the old lady is ragging on me about this ring. Yap, yap, yap. I was going nuts, so I got out of the trailer to have a look at these valves. I didn't know which was which. I was fiddling around, and must have turned one of them. I don't know how or why I did that. The old lady had driven me nuts, that's why, and the one I chanced to open did not hold gray | Tree Trimming & Removal Brush chipping Lot clearing Continued on page 10 17 \& LL Firewood Hardwood & Softwood lumber - Glenn Guernsey 476-3757 ¢