Say what?

How do you know when you've made it? When random people from Oklahoma stop you in the street and ask, "Hey, are you the real shliach?" Is that how you know you've made it?

Because it's happened. I was stopped on the street. A bochur from Oklahoma asked if I was TRS. I answered in the affirmative. Yay. Now I can die happy.
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Meanwhile, in other news, I once wrote a story entitled "There was..." It's a little odd. Enjoy.

Many years ago, in a land far, far away, there was a very old man who had severe brain damage. The result of this was that he didn't recognize his children. It was all very sad. His children would visit him in the nursing home once a month, and they always made sure to bring flowers and chocolates, because who doesn't like flowers and chocolates?

Unfortunately, like many things in life, the assumptions of the man's children proved to be false, and in fact he couldn't stand flowers and chocolate. Every time he saw them he would get a pathological hatred for all things verdant and caffeinated, and once he got so angry he pulled the plug on his life support and thus life ended.

That is really only the beginning of this story, because later on all his children decided to go to group therapy in order to get over their collective grief. Their guilt was also terrible to behold, but as everyone knows guilt is good for people, so they weren't calling in the psychological people to solve that problem.

During the group therapy the question was broached as to what exactly the children could do to get over their collective grief. One of the grandchildren proposed that they separate the collective grief and make it more personal, as that would save them all a lot of money with the group therapy. The group therapist quickly pointed out that this course of action would result in the group therapist losing his current position, and probably end up with much death, and possibly dismemberment, for the group therapist's family members, many of whom relied on him for their daily bread and caviar. Another family member, this time a favored nephew, proposed that the group therapist's family members stop eating caviar, and instead eat sushi, which had the undoubted advantage of not only being tastier but also cheaper.

A fracas ensued as a troop of Russian and Japanese performance artists burst into the room and started to argue about the relative merits of their respective national foods. Most of the family members started to throw the complementary doughnuts, thoughtfully provided by the group therapist, at the Russians, because no one likes sturgeon anyway. Incredibly enough, no one was hurt.

The local Shliach walked in and said, "What in the world is going on?" Immediately everyone stopped what they were doing and began to explain. The Shliach was not very impressed with their explanations and decided to do something drastic. He turned off the lights, and bedlam instantly commenced. The editor being out of town on a Hawaiian vacation, grammar started to dissolve in on itself and whole sentences began to die. Lakewood itself, home of more giants in Torah per capita than any other township in New Jersey, and also one of the last remaining real tennis courts in the world. But that's another story for another day.