My father once told me that a great writer named Johnson said that a pun is the lowest form of humor possible. Then my father said that is true only if you didn’t think of that pun yourself.
I take little responsibility for this story. Dale Wallace is the culprit. I just wrote it.
“You want chicken? O.K. Wait one minute.”
While I waited I went out on the porch of the Ali Baba restaurant. I don’t really care for rotisserie chicken but I can’t resist a sign that says, ‘Chiken ~ $15.’
“Hey, Dennis! Check out the banjo.”
It was Dale Wallace, driving down the alley from B.C.’s on a golf cart over loaded with musical gear. There was so much equipment he barely had room for himself on the golf cart seat.
When he pulled the cart over next to the porch I asked, “Isn’t that Casey Moore’s banjo? Man, that thing looks great.”
“Yeah,” Dale said. “I just had someone polish all the chrome. Now, I have to get home with it and I don’t even have room on this golf cart.”
“I guess that’s why you had it balanced on your lap,” I said.
“I have to be careful with it,” he said. “This thing was made in the 1930’s”
He cautiously put the banjo back on his lap and got ready to pull on to Coconut Drive. The banjo slipped from his lap and slid between the steering wheel and his knee, mashing his foot on the accelerator. The golf cart shot out into the street and head-on into another golf cart.
“Dale! Dale!” I yelled, leaping from the porch of Ali Baba’s. “Are you alright?”
“Oh, my God! Dale, are you hurt?”
It was Susannah Eiley, driver of the golf cart that Dale had crashed into. Susannah and I reached Dale’s cart at about the same time. He was lying back in the seat with his eyes closed.
“What happened?” Susannah asked, as she started crying. “I didn’t even see where he came from. Oh, I hope he’s alright.”
Dale stirred and opened his eyes. Then he said, “Oh, Susannah don’t you cry for me. I come from Ali Baba with a banjo on my knee.”
