Monday, November 1, 2010

An overly expository first day

"Sherman!" Good Doctor Peabody slapped the youth's shoulder affectionately. "What brings you here today?"

"Actually, you asked me to come here Doctor."

"So I did, so I did. And remember what I've told you. It's 'Good Doctor Peabody'. Always. Never 'Doctor'. Last thing I need are intellectual property lawyer types breathing down my neck ... More annoying than the Screaming Broccoli of Riga Minor..."

As usual, Peabody (Sherman saw no need to use his full name with internal dialogue) was only making sense if half of what he said was ignored. But it would be absurd to expect a time-traveling culinary historian to make sense.

But making sense or not, Peabody would expect a reply.

"Sorry, Good Doctor Peabody. And to what do you owe my presence?"

"Breakfast, my lad. Breakfast."

"Breakfast?"

"Breakfast."

Sherman and Good Doctor Peabody could (and did) keep up this exchange of a single word with differing intonations for some time. We'll skip ahead to the point where Peabody provides new information.

"Not just breakfast. Breakfast in bed."

"In bed?"

"In bed."

Again we must fast-forward.

"Are they royalty", asked Sherman. He was well aware of the restrictions on travel using the CHEST. Both time and space were navigable, but only to 'fixed points' in culinary history - points so key to the timestream as to be unchangeable.

"No, no, not royals. Common folk. Many, many of them."

"5? 50? Twelve dozen?"

"No, no, no. You set your expectations far too low Sherman. Far, far too low. Breakfast in bed for 400,000!"

Sherman gasped.

"The coordinates are set. August 16, 1969. Outside Bethel, New York. Max Yasgur's farm. Sherman, my lad, we are Woodstock bound!"

... TO BE CONTINUED

[when I type in brackets like this I'm writing 'outside' the story. First real post and already I'm off track. I intend to provide a recipe with each post, which I have failed to do here. Set-up taking longer than expected. Oh well, tomorrow I guess.]

No comments:

Post a Comment