Portrait of Words

Poor Nancy has now heard at least ten different versions of the incident at Last Lutheran and what happened afterward. In one Pastor Joan is stabed and taken to the Clinic. In another she karate chops the knife out of the hand of the intruder and holds him while Chief Ican is called.
Her favorite is where the secretary shoots the man in the face with the fire extinguisher causing him to drop the knife.
Small town have a way of enlarging events in their retelling. They add just a little to make it more exciting in the telling.
The story of Chief Ican losing the guy on the train hasn’t had much time to circulate and already the facts have changed a bit. In the latest version Chief Ican was looking right at the criminal when there was a puff of smoke and he was gone. All that was left was a little pile of ash. Chief Ican, according to this version, thinks it was spontaneous combustion.
Nancy likes all the stories and is a good listener. She knows stories sell a lot of coffee and saffron buns. People would feel guilty coming to tell her the story without buying something.

A Picture Story from Portrait of Words

Clown University

This is Horatio Clam University
It has a huge football field and a mediocre team.
It would like to have a nationally ranked team but that will never happen because it is located way back in the woods of Upper Michigan.
Despite plenty of recruiting money they just can't attract quality players. One of the coaches commented the other day that "the day one our quarterbacks makes it to the NFL the Devil will ride to work on a snow mobile. We haven't even had a victory parade in years"

So good old Horatio Clam will never be known as a producer of great football players. It does have one distinction though. The top clowns in the country have come from Horatio.
They don't put that in their brochures but its true. THe top clowns in the three top circuses in the country graduated from Horatio. That funny clown that is the center of the "Little Red Car TV show graduated from there.
They don't have a school for clowns and their drama department is at best mediocre so the only reason anyone can give for this phenomenon is that there is so little to do in the town where the University is located that the students spend a lot of time clowning around.