Colliding stories

An animated attachment for Ernie and Bert arrives from a friend.

...

Bert: He says, “Beware of the lupo, the wolf.”

Ernie: Play it.

Bert: I wonder if he made it himself. Maybe he’s going from filming Sunday mass to making animation videos.

Ernie: Here it comes. Three little pigs. Chased by a big bad wolf. They rush inside, bolt the door, he’s on the roof, they put a pot of boiling water in the fireplace, splash, they clap the lid on, boil it up and rush outside, take the lid off.

Bert: Uh oh. Some presents, a boot, a red hat. It was Santa Claus! They boiled Santa.

Ernie: And look how sad the waiting reindeer look.

...

Colliding stories

Tim Schtartit and Tom Stopitz meet at the Blue Angel Cafe.

Tim: I liked that story about bee swarms keeping on moving to search for new homes outside the range of cell phone microwaves. Going ever deeper upcountry and new stealing bicycles to do it.

Tom: Very wry. Rather postmodern.

Tim: I thought it was about colliding unverses. Nature and technology.

Tom: Well, colliding stories anyway. Stories are not self-contained. When they collide, they break into pieces and the bits fly off and become new stories. A true story is always a compound of half truths and you never reach the truth because there's always something more to say.

Tim: Like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

Tom: Or Brazil.

Tim: Brazil?

Tom: It wasn't about Brazil. Anyway, it's a story which ends with bureaucrats ordering me to employ life-guards at my pond whenever I have a party. Where will it end?