Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 7, 1991 TAG: 9102060239
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Ben Beagle
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Now, now, ladies, don't stop here and go work the Jumble. We won't get risque.
I'm not talking about the kind of fantasy in which Kim Novak and I are both young again and madly in love and cavorting on a desert island.
That's right, junior. Kim as in N-O-V-A-K, not as in B-A-S-I-N-G-E-R.
There is nothing wrong with Kim as in B-A-S-I-N-G-E-R. It's just that I've decided, for the purposes of this column anyway, that I'm too old for her.
But to the fantasies:
Fantasy One: I walk out of the house one Monday afternoon with the garbage and the old Cherokee is standing there, shining and new, just like it was in January of 1978, when it came into my life.
The fender, which I damaged when I nudged the post in the parking lot while shamelessly girl watching, is whole again. Even the Indian head is there. No rust.
Fantasy Two: I finish the suggested number of sets of exercises on this machine we got for a song at Big Lots a couple of years ago and go upstairs.
I sense that I am very light and I open the trunk and get out the britches to my old uniform.
They fit perfectly and - just hang on, ladies, this isn't going to get too erotic - I take off my sweat shirt to find that my stomach muscles resemble a washboard.
Fantasy Three: Still wearing the uniform britches, although they are smelling up the kitchen with the odor of mothballs, I dig around in this big crock and find the checking account statement I have been avoiding for days.
A few confident moves with my trusty solar calculator and I am within two cents of the figure the bank has come up with - as opposed to former differences ranging from $25.34 to $126.07.
I run around the kitchen screaming: "Only two cents! Only two cents, do you hear? Ahahahahahahahahahahahah!"
Fantasy Four: I control myself and wander outside to inspect the paint on the house.
It seems that the house now has the ability to paint itself. Several blisters have disappeared and it has trimmed its own windows.
The large brown sections of wire grass in the yard have disappeared. It is not too early to tell they have been replaced with one of the finest species of lawn grass known to modern horticulture.
I walk around the house. Whoa! Is that Kim Novak - looking like she did in "Picnic" - there in the azaleas near the birdbath?
by CNB