Fruitesque

I attended a workshop yesterday at my church, and as one of the exercises, we were asked to select a picture from an assortment of fruit images. The idea was to select one that you felt reflected you in some fashion, and then share with one other person what your rationale was.

I took a picture of a sliced kiwi fruit, and walked over to Philip, asking why he had chosen a pear. "Well, it could be because of my shape," he began, "but honestly, a pear has a lot of the same characteristics as an apple, so it is familiar, but it is different enough that it isn't so...I don't know, common?" I nodded in agreement. "Why did you take a kiwi?"

"They're fuzzy and a little funny looking, but still good," I replied. "They're not quite sweet, not quite sour, and often they are at their best when paired with something else, like strawberry-kiwi juice."

"Not bad," said Philip.

"Thanks. I thought we had to explain our choice to the whole group though; if I'd known it was just going to be us, I would have taken the strawberry."

He cocked an eyebrow and asked, "Why's that?"

"Because knowing how they are fertilized, it is encouraging to know that sometimes a bunch of bullshit can produce something pretty sweet."

During Operation Desert Storm, Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf responded to a reporter's suggestion of something completely unrealistic by saying, "I would categorize that statement as bovine scatology."

Dad had a set of moose antlers on a plaque in our family room when I was a child. I was too young to understand that the accreditation on the plaque stating it had been shot by my father with a .22 long rifle at a distance of 300 yards was patently absurd; even if the bullet could reach the beast at that range, it would be an annoyance and not a threat. He chided me about it in my teens one time; "C'mon Stephen, I would have thought the inscription gave it away, the one that says 'Excreta Taurus Fulgeat Sapientum'."

"I don't read Latin, Dad; what's it mean?"

"I was told it comes across as 'Bullshit Baffles Brains'..."

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