SATURDAY NIGHT TALENT SHOW

The Professor, who is not a performer by nature, came up with the idea on Saturday afternoon of having a family talent show that night.  The performers would be The Professor, Foghorn, and The Warden, with The Vulcan acting as M.C. (presumably because he has no visible talent).  The Inmates disappeared down the basement stairs to practice and I tried to think of an appropriate act I could put on.

 

The Vulcan is almost incapable of taking a picture
without blinking.  I call them his "stoner eyes."

Around eight o'clock The Inmates began dragging chairs into the living room and gathering props.  It was decided we would perform in descending order by age, which meant that after The Vulcan's introduction I was the first to go on.  I took the echo microphone from The Vulcan, my loyal hound dog at my feet, and began my rendition of "People Will Say We're in Love" from Oklahoma!  Almost immediately the dog let out a groan and rolled onto her back with her feet in the air.  By the time I reached the last lines, which were quite loud and quite high, the audience had their hands over their ears and St. Jimmi took off running.  At least they didn't throw tomatoes.

Next was The Professor.  He was introduced, we applauded, and he immediately ran into the family room, overcome by stage fright.  I tried to tell him nothing could be more humiliating than having the family dog exit your performance, but he was having none of it.  We had this problem before.  When Foghorn was a baby he decided he wanted to do his own version of A Christmas Carol on New Year's Eve.  I spent most of the day drawing the Cratchitt family and hanging them like puppets since we only had three performers.  The Professor was to be Marley's Ghost and Chester put a ghostly white makeup on him.  We no more got started when he took off and the performance was cancelled.  So much for "the show must go on."

Foghorn gladly took her turn, doing wondrous feats of balancing.  The Vulcan then decided to fill in for The Professor by showing his super-human strength.  He did this by lifting Foghorn, who weighs about as much as The Vulcan's laptop.  I gave him a challenge and told him to lift me.  Big mistake, since he only got me six inches off the ground before dropping me.  To avoid landing on a prone Foghorn, I tumbled sideways right onto my knees.  I then demonstrated my best talent -- dropping F-bombs.

As the finale I was given the microphone again.  St. Jimmi had returned and was curled up next to the couch.  I sat down beside her and went into "I Think I Love You."  Before I even got to the part about being "right in the middle of a good dream," she took off for parts unknown.  I think that dog has a problem with Shirley Jones.