Taste That Beats The Others Cold

LONG AGO there was a radio commercial for Pepsi Cola and it was very scratchy and there were some happy men that kept repeating two things, only two things, and one of them was nickel or five cents which is how much Pepsi Cola cost and the other thing was trickle which they repeated without any other words whatsoever and I always think of trickle having to do with blood in an old-fashioned western, which blood always did out of the hero's mouth when he was dying and trying very hard to say something important or something about love or regret but very heroic still—I think the word is stalwart—and watching the old westerns it never occurred to me that there was anything painful about dying, it just seemed like it was much harder to gather your thoughts, just like it was when you were about to fall asleep after your mother read you a bedtime story, a nice old-fashioned story, so it really seemed as though there was nothing at all to be afraid of, unlike now when it seems truly horrifying, but then no it seemed a little panty but that was about it and to top it off everyone paid attention to everything you said even though you said it so slowly it was almost aggravating and yet they listened so closely, I often think try getting that out of people in the third grade or even at a high school dance or poor old Ivan Ilych or better yet at a cocktail party when everyone is completely ripped and how strange, you think how strange it is that you remember so many books you read in the third grade and yet cocktail parties, no not a thing ...

Still, I never associated trickle with Pepsi Cola. The Wild West, yes, dying, yes, and maybe, maybe very very quiet sounds in the desert during the heat of the day before the cold sets in. Until then though, during the heat of the day it's nice to think about good things and relax. Have a Pepsi Cola, for instance. Have a Pepsi Cola icy and delicious—just a nickel before the cold sets in.


Because I Took The SATs

FEW GRAPES KNOW HOW to add or subtract, but Gerald was quite unlike most grapes in this respect.

"One cow upon the hill, two in the valley," he would say as he crested the hill on his morning walk to the store. "That makes three."

The cow upon the hill seemed to know that he was being counted, as if by telepathy, and so he gazed lovingly upon Gerald the Grape and smiled.

Gerald smiled too, but he was not noticing the telepathic cow on the hill. He was considering three friendly things instead: pencils, dollars and subtraction.

"I need to buy three pencils at the store in order to write my autobiography," said Gerald. "The store sells them at a fair rate of 12¢ for two. Since I have a quarter, how much money will I have left over once I have purchased four?" he asked, almost rhetorically, to the silence of the hill and cow, as if to hone his skills as a teacher, which is a profession he was considering lately, more for the sheer pleasure of sharing his knowledge of figures than to make money, although he did fancy the idea of owning a row boat.

Gerald continued to contemplate the problem he had made up all by himself. By now he was close to the gas station where the friendly gas station attendant, Harold, would greet him with a friendly "Hello!" or sometimes "How is the addition and subtraction going?" which Gerald, who was thoughtful, inevitably answered in the same fashion: "Splendidly, I suppose," which was a very sensible answer, since addition and subtraction are always usually going the same way, and since we can never really suppose how well things are going in general, nor what might happen next, particularly in this world, which has become rather unpredictably topsy-turvy of late.

After all, did you imagine this morning that by this evening you would be reading a story about a grape that adds and subtracts with a friend named Harold who is a very friendly gas station attendant? Even if you had, would you have imagined that the grape could walk, or that the story would end like this?


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