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} Well, all right, but only if you promise to go right to sleep
} afterwards.
}
} Once upon a time, there was a prince named Silurian. He was tall and
} fair and handsome and wealthy, and what he loved more than anything else
} in the world was heavy construction equipment. Because he was wealthy,
} he had a construction site built in the palace garden, and he used to
} spend his days digging holes with his backhoe, pushing dirt around with
} his bulldozer, or setting girders into position with his crane. All the
} butlers and the maids from the palace had to put on hardhats and act as
} other workers on the site, but they didn't like this very much because
} they always got their clothes dirty and the Queen would yell at them.
}
} Now, one day, Silurian was excavating in readiness for a new office
} tower -- "Bite, dump! Bite, dump!" he'd say to himself as the shovel
} took another load and dropped it into the waiting dumptruck -- when all
} of a sudden Jesus Christ appeared. He just materialized in the hole,
} just where Silurian was about to take another bite. He was sitting on a
} donkey, and was carrying a Sony Walkman, but Silurian recognized him at
} once from the picture on the wall in the church where the King and the
} Queen made him go every Sunday.
}
} "I have a special mission for you," Jesus called up to Silurian. "You
} must take this to Mother Teresa in Calcutta." As he said this, a
} cylinder materialized in Silurian's hand. It was green and shimmering,
} and although it had no pattern on it, when Silurian looked at it, it
} seemed as if he could see every pattern and every color all at once.
} "But why can't you . . . ?" Silurian called out to Jesus; but it was
} too late, and he had vanished.
}
} So Silurian called his travel agent and booked a flight to Calcutta, and
} even though he was wealthy he got a cheap fare by booking seven days in
} advance and staying over Saturday night, for it is by such methods that
} the wealthy become and stay that way. In any case, he welcomed the
} delay of seven days, for he was entranced with the beauty of the green
} cylinder, and was pleased to be able to keep it a little longer.
}
} Meanwhile, in Islamabad, in the dingy cellar of a coffee shop, two
} desperate members of the Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Everything
} Non-Islamic were plotting. The plastic surgeon they had kipnapped had
} responded to their threats of torture and had agreed to do as they
} demanded. An old woman walked in the door. "Mother," cried the younger
} man, "You have come!" "Yes, my son," she replied, "I am willing to play
} my part for Islam and the destruction of the government of India."
} "Then," said the other man, who had been silent up till now, sucking on
} a goat, "You are willing to be turned into a replica of Mother Teresa
} and take her place when we abduct her!"
}
} Just at the moment, Mother Teresa herself was on her knees on the dusty
} floor of her Calcutta orphanage, wiping up the blood and spittle with
} the corner of her habit, when a pair of feet came into her field of
} view. They were not the feet of a street beggar, but the strong, feet
} of a healthy young man barely twenty. She looked up, and found herself
} staring into one of the most handsome faces she had ever seen. "I am
} Brother Stigmata," he said, "I have been assigned to work with you." But
} Mother Teresa's mind was not on what he said but one what she felt. For
} the first time since she was a young teenager, she felt desire for the
} body of another human being. "But no!" she thought to herself, "I
} mustn't!"
}
} But by the time Silurian had landed in Calcutta one week later, she had
} shared the young priest's bed not once but three times. "Eternal
} damnation is a small price to pay for this beauty," she would say to him
} each time. So when the handsome Silurian came knocking on her door, she
} at first thought he was from the Vatican and had come to take her to
} hell. Before Silurian could explain his mission, however, the sound of
} mortar fire, close by, was heard, and Vytautis Landsbergis pushed his
} way through. "Do you have a piano?", he asked breathlessly, "I need to
} send a message to the Kremlin. They've cut all --
}
} -- Oh, you're asleep already. Thank goodness!
}
} When you wake up, you owe the Oracle a bedtime story from Newsweek.
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