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From Grandpa Jamieson
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The Adventures of Sneezer McGeezer
Madame Lasagna
Ebenezer McGeezer had a perfectly normal childhood. Oh, sure, some of the kids at school made fun of his name, as kids often do, tagging him with the nickname "Scrooge" after the character Ebenezer Scrooge in the Charles Dickens story "A Christmas Carol." But, being a good-natured kid, Ebenezer took it all in stride and was popular with his classmates. He was a good student, a pretty decent athlete, and he played the tuba in the high school band. In other words, his life was pretty normal.
After graduating from high school, young Ebenezer enrolled at a nearby college to study engineering. Then one day a travelling carnival arrived in a nearby town and started setting up for the county fair. And, as luck would have it, Ebenezer and a couple of his friends, Iggy Schwartz and Joey Chung, decided to visit the carnival one evening. It was a decision that would change the course of young Ebenezer's life forever.
As they wandered the grounds, they came upon a fortune teller billing herself as Madame Lasagna. Her name made Ebenezer and his friends laugh, so they decided to have their fortunes read. None of them believed in this fortune-telling hocus-pocus, of course, but they all thought that it would be good for a laugh or two.
"Welcome, " said Madame Lasagna as they entered the darkened tent. "What can I do for your boys?"
"We'd like to have our fortunes read," said Ebenezer, and the other boys nodded in silent agreement.
"OK," responded Madame Lasagna. "Who wants to go first?"
"I will," answered Iggy. "I'm pretty sure that I have a bright future ahead of me."
"We'll see," said Madame Lasagna skeptically. She started by asking him a few questions about his future plans, whether he was a student at the nearby college, and so on. Then, lifting one eyebrow, she added, "Take a seat, young man, and we'll see what your future really holds."
Iggy sat down at the table directly across from Madame Lasagna. At the center of the table sat a crystal ball, into which Madame Lasagna began to stare intently. She furrowed her brow, then her eyes widened, and she began to speak in hushed tones. "Great Orb, I beseech thee, bring this young man the insight he desires. Come forth, Great Orb! We humbly await your revelations."
Watching from the sidelines, Ebenezer began to giggle, but quickly stifled it when Madame Lasagna shot a withering glance his way. She had a very scary manner about her that sent a chill down Ebenezer's spine. "Sorry," he mumbled, as she turned her attention back to the crystal ball. Ebenezer stared at his shoes, afraid to make eye contact with this frightening old woman.
Madame Lasagna mumbled some predictions to Iggy, the usual fare about meeting a mysterious stranger and that sort of thing. What a bunch of hooey, thought Ebenezer, but he didn't say anything. Still, it was hard for him to suppress a smile or two and - to his chagrin - Madame Lasagna noticed again. And she was not pleased.
When she was done with Iggy, she asked him for five dollars, he paid her, and then he stood up to leave. "Next!" commanded Madame Lasagna, motioning for Joey to take a seat. Iggy left the tent, trying hard to suppress a snicker on the way out. Madame Lasagna went through the same routine with Joey and then, as he left the tent, motioned to Ebenezer to take a seat at the table.
"And now, my skeptical friend," she said, "let's see what the future has in store for you." She gazed deeply into the crystal ball and a look of horror passed over her face. Suddenly. as if possessed, she sat bolt upright in her chair, staring at some faraway point in space, and began to mumble nonsensically.
Finally, she stood up, pointing a bony finger directly into Ebenezer's face, and slowly spoke these words: "A phrase you will hear, a phrase you will fear, a curse upon you, Ebenezer! You've mocked the Great Orb, this lesson absorb, that phrase will make you a sneezer!" Suddenly, whatever had possessed her appeared to release her and she slumped back down into her chair.
After regaining her composure, she calmly announced, "That'll be five dollars, young man."
"That's it?" asked Ebenezer, shaking his head and laughing. He took out a five dollar bill, tossed it on the table, and walked towards the exit. "What a waste of money!" he mumbled to no one in particular.
"Ebenezer," said Madame Lasagna, stopping him in his tracks. "That's nothing to sneeze about!"
Suddenly, Ebenezer sneezed powerfully, so powerfully that he lost his balance and landed on his rear end on the floor of the tent. "Excuse me," he said, embarrassed at his sudden involuntary outburst. But as he got up to leave the tent, he could hear Madame Lasagna cackling behind him. "That phrase will make you a sneezer! Ebenezer the sneezer!" she called out. "Sneezer McGeezer! Hahahahahaha!"
"So how was your fortune?" asked Joey. "Kind of weird," said Ebenezer, but definitely not worth five bucks. She put a curse on me!" "Oh, wow!" laughed Joey. "You must have really rubbed her the wrong way."
Iggy and Joey immediately began calling him Sneezer McGeezer, a nickname that was destined to stick. Neither he nor they had yet made the connection between that powerful sneeze and the mysterious force that had triggered it. As far as they were concerned, it had been nothing more than a hilarious coincidence. But they would soon begin to wonder about that.
Next, the boys made their way onto the midway to enjoy the rides. They started with the Tilt-a-Whirl, the Scrambler, and the Graviton, and then it was off to the Ferris Wheel. As they were getting onto the Ferris Wheel, they began talking and laughing about their experiences with Madame Lasagna. By the time they got to Ebenezer's story, the Ferris Wheel was rotating smoothly. As they rose to the top, Ebenezer mentioned the phrase "that's nothing to sneeze about" and everyone laughed.
"That's nothing to sneeze about!" repeated Iggy in dramatic fashion, laughing as he did. Suddenly, Ebenezer felt an uncontrollable urge to sneeze, an urge so powerful that he simply could not resist it, so sneeze he did. And what a sneeze it was! It was so powerful that it actually reversed the spin of the Ferris Wheel, causing everyone on it to scream in fear. The sound of that sneeze, the screams of the riders, and the sudden reversal of the great wheel attracted the attention of the crowd below. Everyone stood silently, mouths agape, staring up at the strange phenomenon. But, unable to make sense of what they had just witnessed, they slowly turned away and life returned to normal.
The passengers were removed from the Ferris Wheel and the carnival workers apologized profusely for what they had experienced. Free tickets were passed out for other rides and the Ferris Wheel was shut down for the rest of the evening because it was feared that there might have been some sort of mechanical problem. However, upon investigation, nothing was found. The story appeared in the local newspaper and on the television news, where it was presented as an unexplained oddity.
There was even a video of the incident, shot by a local high school student of his friends on the Ferris Wheel. And that video quickly went viral, with seven million views on Youtube in a single day.
Ebenezer and his friends began to wonder whether there was actually something to the old woman's curse. It seemed too crazy to be true, but then again that sneeze was pretty hard to explain. Ebenezer decided to find out what was going on. "Hey, guys," he said, "let's do a scientific experiment!" "OK," said Iggy, "let's grab some snow cones and sit down somewhere to talk about it."
After discussing the idea, the trio agreed on a plan and decided to execute it in the morning. They drove out into the country in Iggy's car and stopped next to a large field. After walking about a hundred yards out into the field, they stopped and Ebenezer cried out, "That's nothing to sneeze about!" Nothing happened, so he tried it several more times, getting the same result each time. "Well, I guess it's true," laughed Iggy, raising his arms for emphasis. "That really is nothing to sneeze about!" "Yep," agreed Joey, "that's nothing to sneeze about." And then, as if on cue, Ebenezer unleashed another massive sneeze.
"Whoa!" shouted Iggy and Joey in unison. Then Ebenezer said, "Maybe it only works when someone else says it. Let's find out. But please, guys, let's not overdo it. That sneeze took a lot out of me."
"I'll bet it did!" laughed Joey. "It's a good thing you did it out here in the middle of nowhere. Otherwise, you might be facing a big bill for the repair or replacement of damaged property."
For the rest of the afternoon, the boys tried to trigger Ebenezer's curse, a curse that none of them doubted anymore. What they discovered was that it only worked when someone other than Ebenezer spoke the fateful words and that the magnitude of the sneeze could be controlled by how loudly the phrase was spoken. But the triggering phrase had to contain precisely these five words - "that's nothing to sneeze about" - or it would not work. They even tried to say it in French and Spanish, but it only worked in English. Joey kept careful notes, dreaming of a possible Nobel Prize for discovering a new force of nature.
Iggy and Joey, both pre-med students, were quite excited about these discoveries and began talking about launching a formal research project into Ebenezer's condition. Ebenezer, on the other hand, did not take kindly to the prospect of serving as their lab rat, and he said so. "Let's go see Madame Lasagna," he added. "Maybe we can get her to lift her curse if I apologize for whatever offense I might have caused her. I'll bet that she will forgive me. At least I hope so."
"Not me!" exclaimed Iggy. "I wouldn't go anywhere near that crazy old woman."
"Me neither," said Joey. "If you want to see her again, I'm afraid that you will have to go by yourself."
"Oh, thanks a lot, guys," responded Ebenezer. "But I guess I can't blame you."
The following day, Ebenezer returned to the site of the carnival, only to discover that it had packed up and left town. After making the necessary inquiries, he tracked down the current location of the carnival. It was in a town about 200 miles away, so Ebenezer borrowed Iggy's car and drove to that location. He began searching the grounds for Madame Lasagna's tent, but could not find it anywhere. Finally, stumbling upon the manager's trailer, he knocked on the door.
"What can I do for you, son," asked the manager, who came to the door chomping on what remained .
of a cigar. He seemed slightly irritated that Ebenezer had interrupted the TV show he had been watching.
"I'm looking for Madame Lasagna," answered Ebenezer. "I need to see her about something."
"Oh," said the manager, with a concerned look on his face. "Are you her next of kin?"
"Uh, no," said Ebenezer. "I need to see her about an important, uh, business matter."
"Well, I'm sorry son," said the manager, "but Madame Lasagna passed away just last night. Choked on a chicken bone, they say. Is there anything I can help you with?"
"Oh, no!" exclaimed Ebenezer. "Do you know anyone who can lift a curse?"
"Oh, thufferin' thuccotash!" exclaimed the manager, imitating Sylvester the Cat and affecting an expression of mock horror. "So you're another victim of a curse cast by the wicked Madame Lasagna! Sheesh! You're not really that gullible, are you, kid? She didn't have any occult powers. It was just an act. The exotic Madame Lasagna was just plain old Mrs. Maria McGillicutty from Newark, New Jersey."
"A couple of days ago," said Ebenezer, "I would have agreed with that, but -."
"Get lost!" said the manager, cutting him off and slamming the door in his face.
"Now what?" thought Ebenezer. "Am I going to be stuck with this curse for the rest of my life?"
Ebenezer made the long drive back to campus with a heavy heart.
A Mysterious Stranger
A few days went by and Ebenezer, resigned to his fate, returned to normal life. Over time. he began to appreciate that the common expression "that's nothing to sneeze about" was not used nearly as often as he had feared. And besides, midterm exams were coming up and he had to study for them.
Ebenezer liked to study at a coffee shop near the campus. It was reasonably quiet and no one normally bothered him there. On one particular day, though, a mysterious stranger approached his table and asked if he could sit down there. Ebenezer looked up and, not recognizing him, said that he was studying for a very important exam.
"I won't stay for long, Ebenezer . It is Ebenezer, isn't it?" replied the man.
"Yes," answered Ebenezer slowly. "How do you know my name?"
"You're a very famous person these days, Ebenezer," replied the stranger. "Don't you know that?"
"Oh, right," said Ebenezer, "you saw the video on Youtube."
"That's right," said the man. "Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Preston Winthorpe and I am from ... well ... for now let's just say that I'm a talent scout for a very important organization. And I would like to discuss your rather unique talent."
"My talent?" asked Ebenezer. "What talent is that?"
"Oh, come now, Ebenezer. Don't be modest. I'm talking about your amazing sneeze factor."
"Ah, yes," repeated Ebenezer, "my amazing sneeze factor. As ridiculous as this may sound, it is actually a curse. And I mean that quite literally, although I'm pretty sure that you would not believe that."
"You might be surprised by what I would believe. I see a lot of amazing things - so-called unbelievable things - in my line of work and I have learned to believe in a great number of them." Then, shifting to another subject, he asked, "What are your career plans, Ebenezer?"
"I am studying to be an engineer," replied Ebenezer, showing him the cover of his book on thermodynamics.
"Well, what would you say if I told you that a career in engineering might be a tragic waste of your talent? The world needs people like you and I have come to try to recruit you. Will you hear me out?"
"Sure," said Ebenezer, "but I must warn you that you are probably wasting your time. Besides, like I said when you first arrived, I'm studying for an important exam right now. Perhaps some other time?"
"Fair enough, Ebenezer. Here is my card. Give me a call when your exams are over and we can discuss what may be a very exciting alternative future for you."
"OK, thanks a lot," said Ebenezer. They shook hands and the mysterious stranger disappeared as quickly as he had arrived. Ebenezer placed the card in his text book as a book mark and signaled the waitress that he would like another cup of coffee.
"I wonder," thought Ebenezer, "what that guy has in mind for me?" Then he laughed out loud, thinking to himself that the man was probably a talent scout for a circus.
The Funny Farm
After he graduated from college, Ebenezer began looking for an engineering job. Unfortunately, the job market was pretty tight at the time, so he took a temporary job flipping burgers at a local hamburger emporium. He kept applying for engineering jobs, but there were no openings. As time went on, that temporary job began looking more permanent every day. It was pretty discouraging.
Then one day, as he was slaving away over a hot hamburger grill, Ebenezer remembered that mysterious stranger who had once approached him with an even more mysterious job offer. Once again, he laughed it off, thinking that he had to have been recruiting for the circus. But then, right in the middle of a hamburger flip, he thought to himself, "So what? Even working for a circus would be better than having to flip burgers for the rest of my life. At least I will end up with some interesting stories to tell my grandchildren some day!"
"I quit!" he yelled to no one in particular, and when no one in particular paid any attention to his pronouncement, he simply walked over to the time clock, inserted his time card, and clocked out for the last time. With a bounce in his step, he thought, "I'm off to join the circus!"
When he got back to his small rented room, Ebenezer began looking for the mysterious stranger's business card, hoping that he had not thrown it away. He remembered being in a coffee shop studying for an exam when the man had approached him and vaguely remembered sticking the card between the pages of one of his books. But which one? Fortunately, he still had them all, so after a brief search he found it right where he had left it, between two pages of his old thermodynamics text book. "Eureka!" he shouted as he kissed the card. "I sure hope he remembers me," thought Ebenezer. "And I sure hope that he still works for that circus." He dialed the number and then crossed his fingers for luck.
The phone rang twice and then a woman with a very professional sounding voice came on the line. "Mr. Winthorpe's office," she said. "How may I help you?" Ebenezer explained how he had been approached by Mr. Winthorpe and that he had been asked to call this number if he was interested. "Well," said Ebenezer, "I know that it has been a long time since he and I last spoke, but f the offer is still good, I am interested. Well, at least I might be, depending on what he was offering. You see, he didn't go into much detail."
She put his call through immediately and Winthorpe picked up the phone after a few rings. "Mr. McGeezer," he said, "It's good to hear from you! I was beginning to think that you had forgotten all about what we discussed back in your college days." Then, at least partly in jest, Ebenezer added, "Will I be expected to work with the clowns? Clowns scare the heck out of me."
"Clowns?" responded Winthorpe, sounding slightly offended. "We don't have any clowns at the Funny
Farm." This was the first time that Ebenezer had heard the term Funny Farm, which seemed to confirm that this was indeed going to be a job with the circus or something similar.
But then Winthorpe said something odd: "What we do have at the Funny Farm are a great number of serious, dedicated patriots training rigorously, working diligently, taking risks, and making sacrifices for the protection and betterment of this country and the world. And now I must ask you, Ebenezer, are you that kind of person, a true patriot?" "Uh," said Ebenezer, falling back on his favorite expression. And then, remembering how much he disliked hamburger flipping, he added, "sure."
It was arranged that Ebenezer would report to a certain location, a bus stop in his local community, at precisely 6:00 am, not a minute earlier nor a minute later, on a specific day in the following week. He was instructed to arrive with nothing but a tooth brush, his shaving implements, and the clothes on his back. And he was told to expect to be away from home for at least two weeks.
Ebenezer arrived as instructed and a black SUV pulled up immediately. The door opened and Ebenezer stepped into the back seat. He was blindfolded and told not to speak until he was spoken to. Ebenezer nodded his head in agreement, wondering what he was getting himself into. And then no one spoke another word.
Approximately three hours later, the SUV slowed and made a right turn onto a gravel road. Ebenezer could hear the gravel crunching beneath the tires as the SUV slowly continued down that rather bumpy road. About a mile or so later, the car came to a stop and Ebenezer heard the sound of an electric window being rolled down. "McGeezer," said the driver matter-of-factly. "OK," said a voice from outside the car. "Proceed to the third building on the right and remain in the car until you are cleared." The window rolled back up and the car inched forward, eventually coming to a complete stop about a minute later. No one spoke a word or moved a muscle for a good five minutes. Ebenezer was becoming uneasy about this whole situation, wondering whether he had made a big mistake by agreeing to all of this.
Once again, Ebenezer heard the sound of the driver's window being opened. "McGeezer," said the driver again. Then a voice from outside the car said, "Follow me." The doors were opened and Ebenezer was taken from the car. With someone grasping each arm, he was marched up five steps and into a structure with a wooden floor. Exactly fifteen steps later, he was told to stop, sit, and remove his blindfold. When he did, he found himself in what looked like an old army barracks, painted in that institutional light green color often found in such places. He was seated at a rough wooden table, and surrounded by a group of very serious looking men, all wearing identical black suits, white shirts, and black ties.
"Welcome to the Funny Farm," said one of the men. "Today you will be given an opportunity - a very rare opportunity, I might add - to train for inclusion in a serious and secret organization. And when I say secret, I'm not just a-whistling Dixie. It is probably the most secret organization ever to exist on the face of the earth. Should you decide to continue on, you will begin your basic training today, right here at the Funny Farm. But there are no guarantees. Only a rare few have what it takes to succeed."
Ebenezer was confused, so he asked, "If this organization is so serious and so secret, then why do you call your training facility the Funny Farm?" The men then explained that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the nation's premier spy agency, had a training facility in Virginia that they called the Farm, so, taking a cue from the CIA, this organization decided to call its training facility the Funny Farm. The "funny" part off the name reflected the fact that all of its recruits had "funny" talents - peculiar funny, not ha-ha funny - that might make them valuable assets. Ebenezer, for example, had what they called a "very peculiar sneeze factor."
"And does this organization have a name?" asked Ebenezer. "It has no name," asserted one of the men. "Well," countered another, "that may not be exactly true. It probably has a name, but if so it is available only on a need to know basis, and we don't need to know. For want of a better name, we just call it the organization or the agency. Everyone in the agency knows what we are referring to and no one outside the agency even knows that we exist. So you see, Ebenezer, it all works out for the best."
"Is it a government agency?" asked Ebenezer. "The men all shrugged their shoulders and one of them finally replied, "No one knows for sure, but we think so. What we do know is that we are in the business of solving problems. Problems that no one else seems to be able to handle. Impossible problems, you might say." An awkward pause followed, lasting several seconds before anyone spoke again. Finally, someone asked Ebenezer if he had any more questions and he said, "No, I guess not, for now anyway."
"Good!" said one of the men. "Before we get started, Ebenezer, we will need to take some measurements so that that the tailor can get started on your uniform." "There's a uniform?" asked Ebenezer, surprised that a super secret agency would want its people to wear anything that would allow outsiders to identify its agents. "Well, yes," responded one of the men, "as we see it, you are about to become something of a superhero. The agency is secret, but it would be difficult for you to exercise your talents without being noticed in a very big way, don't you think? So you will do so in the guise of a superhero. No one will suspect that you are part of a secret organization."
"Whoa!" shouted Ebenezer, remembering the outfits worn by comic book superheroes. "Am I going to be wearing tights, a cape, and my underwear on the outside of my pants?" The men all laughed. "No," said one of them, "but you will have to wear a trademark garment of some kind, and I think that we have come up with just the right thing. You come from Scottish stock, don't you, Ebenezer?"
"I am NOT going to wear a kilt!" said Ebenezer defiantly. "No, don't worry," said the man, "but since your ancestry is Scottish, we decided to do some research into Scottish tartans. We couldn't find a McGeezer tartan, but we did learn that the McGeezer clan was closely related to the Stewart clan, so we settled on the Royal Stewart tartan as your trademark pattern. Your uniform will consist of a shirt, a tam o'shanter cap, and socks in the Royal Stewart pattern, along with black pants and shoes. No cape. No tights. No kilt. And no underwear worn on the outside of your pants. What do you think, Ebenezer?"
"Uh, sure," agreed Ebenezer, relieved that he would at least be able to keep his underwear under there.
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"Alright," said another man, "now that we have settled that, let's begin your training." And, sure enough, the training began immediately, with two weeks of physical conditioning (running ten miles every day before breakfast), weight training, parkour training (learning to move rapidly through a series of obstacles by running, jumping, and - in Ebenezer's case - sneezing), martial arts, skydiving, swimming, scuba diving, weapons training, and general resourcefulness. In addition, careful measurements were taken of Ebenezer's nasal capabilities, which would be critical in determining whether there was any point in continuing his training beyond the first two weeks.
Most recruits washed out at end of the first two weeks and were sent home. Ebenezer was one of the five percent who survived, so his training continued for another six months. During this advanced training period, the emphasis was on developing his nasal capabilities, and he worked very hard to be the best he could be. By the end of that six month period, Ebenezer had become a lean mean sneezing machine.
On the day of his graduation, Ebenezer presented himself in uniform on the Field of Honor to receive his diploma and to take the Oath of Service. Mr. Winthorpe presented him with his diploma, congratulated him, shook his hand, administered the oath, and then pronounced Ebenezer a Special Agent First Class. No one else was present, of course, because attendance was on a need to know basis and no one else needed to know. Nevertheless, Ebenezer tossed his tam o'shanter in the air in celebration.
Mr. Winthorpe also gave Ebenezer his official superhero name, the name by which he would henceforth be known to the world. It was a name that Ebenezer had detested for years, but that he would now carry with pride: Sneezer McGeezer. Whenever he appeared anywhere in uniform, he was to use that name only, but never to use it when he was not in uniform. As agent Clark Kent had demonstrated to the agency many years before, most people are so transfixed by the uniform that they do not even recognize the face of a superhero when he or she is not wearing it. Just to be on the safe side, though, Ebenezer would wear a dummy pair of glasses when he was not in uniform, just as agent Kent had done.
After returning home, large amounts of money began appearing in Ebenezer's bank account every month, which he assumed to be his pay. He asked the bank where it came from, hoping to learn the name of the agency, but was told that that information was "available only on a need to know basis and apparently we don't need to know." Sneezer smiled knowingly and said, "Thank you."
Because of that money, Ebenezer was able to purchase a very nice house in an upscale suburban neighborhood in central Virginia. He had a gym built in the backyard where he would spend hours every day training and preparing for a call to action. A year went by and the checks continued rolling in, but there was no call. Ebenezer was beginning to wonder if there ever would be.
Castle Dragonia
It is often said that when the going gets tough, the tough get going. And the going had gotten tough for Ebenezer, who had been training diligently day after day in his backyard gym. He was tired and frustrated that he had not been called to action. So, when the going got tough, Ebenezer decided to get going - on VACATION!
Ebenezer had a couple of weeks of vacation time coming up, so he decided to call in a request to the Funny Farm. The phone number was easy to remember, which was good because agents were forbidden to write it down or to put it in their cell phones. The number was (000) 000-0000. Who, after all, would ever guess that? And even if they did, as soon as the receptionist at the Funny Farm answered the phone, she would ask for the password. The password was "Oh, geez, gimme a break, will ya?" Who would ever guess that?
Ebenezer had been studying vacation brochures and watching travel shows on cable TV for about a month when he finally happened upon a destination that sounded fascinating to him. It was the tiny, secluded, and picturesque eastern European country known as the Kingdom of Dragonia. There were mountains and rivers and castles and mysteries, just the sorts of things that Ebenezer would find intriguing. The entire country had been closed off from the outside world for centuries, so much so that it did not even appear on most maps. However, King Drago had recently opened his kingdom to visitors from the outside world. "What an opportunity!" thought Ebenezer.
Ebenezer dialed (000) 000-0000. The phone rang twice and the receptionist answered it with two words, "Password, please." "Oh, geez, gimme a break, will ya?" responded Ebenezer. "Oh, hi, Ebenezer!" she said. "What can I do for you?" Well," said Ebenezer, "I'm thinking about going on vacation and I've got some time available. Can I get approval for a couple of weeks off?"
After consulting with Ebenezer's superiors, she called him back and told him that his vacation request had been approved, but it would have to be for the last two weeks in October. "I hear that Dragonia is lovely at that time of year," she added. "Well, OK, then," said Ebenezer, "October it is!" Then he asked, "Do you know if they celebrate Halloween over there?" "Gee, I don't know," she answered, "we don't have a lot of information on Dragonian culture. As I'm sure you know, they have been cut off from the rest of the world for centuries. But I'm sure that you will have a good time over there either way. Bon voyage, Ebenezer!" He thanked her and began planning his trip.
Ebenezer began calling all of his friends to see if he could find someone to go with him, but everyone was busy with work or other things and couldn't get away on such short notice. "Oh, well," thought Ebenezer, "I'll just go by myself then. I can certainly use the R&R." "R&R" is a commonly used abbreviation for rest and relaxation.
Browsing through the brochures, Ebenezer ran across an old medieval castle that had been turned into a hotel. The Castle Dragonia, as it was called, was in fact the only hotel in all of Dragonia. "Well," thought Ebenezer, "that makes for an easy decision." He made a reservation there for the last two weeks in October, booked a flight, and began planning activities for his first big international trip. He was very excited about it.
After what seemed like an eternity, the big day finally arrived. Ebenezer had an early morning flight, so he packed his bags the night before. In the morning, he brushed his teeth, shaved, showered, got dressed, and grabbed a quick cup of coffee as he dashed out the door to meet the waiting taxi. Arriving at the airport, he checked his bags, made his way through security, and boarded the plane for his long trans-Atlantic flight. Since there was no airport in Dragonia, he landed in a nearby country and took an ancient steam train into the country. Then he hailed a cab for the long drive up to the Castle Dragonia, which was located on a distant, fog-shrouded mountaintop.
The drive up the mountain was, to put it mildly, a bit spooky. The mountain itself was heavily forested, and it was old-growth forest, thick and dark. The fog grew denser as the old car labored slowly up the slope. The only illumination came from the headlights, which produced eerie shafts of light as they passed through the ever-thickening fog. That in turn created shadows that danced menacingly through the trees. There was no radio and the driver spoke not a word. Neither did Ebenezer, who was exhausted from his long journey and wanted nothing more than to just get to the hotel, have a bite to eat, and then hit the sack.
The car slowed and the driver announced that the engine was overheating. "I'm terribly sorry, sir," he said, "but I will have to go get some water for the radiator." Ebenezer asked where he would get the water and the driver said, "I will have to walk up to the castle. But don't worry, sir, you can remain here. Make yourself comfortable and I will be back in a jiffy." The driver turned off the headlights so that the battery wouldn't run down and then set off on foot through the darkness and the fog.
In the quiet and the darkness, Ebenezer's imagination started working overtime. He heard rustling in the leaves that had fallen to the forest floor and began wondering what was causing it. Chipmunks, perhaps? Maybe squirrels. Of course, it could be something bigger, like a raccoon or a fox. Or a wolf. Or even a bear. A chill ran up Ebenezer's spine as he imagined the driver, alone and on foot, falling prey to some predatory creature. Then Ebenezer would be stuck out here on this road all night. "Well," he said out loud, startling himself with the sound of his own voice, "at least I will be in the car."
After a while, though, Ebenezer began to think logically about the situation. The driver, who was a native Dragonian, hadn't been afraid to set out on foot on this dark and foggy night, so it must be safe out there. Ebenezer opened the door and stepped outside. "Ah, that's better," he thought. "Nothing beats the fresh, clean smell of mountain air!" But way off in the distance, he heard a wolf howl, Another answered. Then another and another and another, until Ebenezer began to feel anxious again. He decided to get back in the car, but discovered that the door had locked behind him when he shut it..
Ebenezer barely had a chance to panic before he found himself surrounded by a pack of wolves. They growled hungrily and every eye was focused on him, lit only by the dim light of the moon as it shone intermittently down through the trees. Ebenezer knew that he could hold them at bay by sneezing, but had no way of triggering one. "Perhaps," he thought, "I could trigger one by getting my voice to echo, but would that work in this dense forest? Or would the trees muffle the sound?"
"Nice wolfie," said Ebenezer soothingly over and over again, as if he was talking to a friendly group of neighborhood dogs. They just inched closer and appeared to be getting ready to pounce. Ebenezer suddenly jumped onto the trunk of the car, then up onto the roof, and shouted as loudly as he could, "That's nothing to sneeze about!" A few seconds later, he heard a faint echo and felt that old familiar urge to sneeze. And sneeze he did. It was a more impressive sneeze than he had anticipated, perhaps enhanced by the power of fear, and it cleared the wolves from the area. It also felled a great many trees, as if a bomb had just exploded in the area. "Oh, boy," thought Ebenezer, "how will I explain this?"
Superheroes are required to protect their true identity at all cost. This is rule number one. To violate this rule would put their family and friends at risk, for they could be held hostage by bad guys to prevent superheroes from performing their superhero duties. Ebenezer knew that he would have to cover up this mess that he had made in the forest or come up with a believable story to account for it. No story came to mind, so he decided to push the car further up the mountain. That way, when the driver returned he would not see the sneeze blast area.
The car looked heavy and the mountain was pretty steep, but Ebenezer had no choice. He picked the lock on the driver's side door, opened it, released the emergency brake, and started pushing. It was hard work, but the car inched slowly forward and, after about fifteen minutes, Ebenezer thought that he had moved it far enough that the blast area would not be visible. He reset the emergency brake , unlocked all of the doors, closed the drive's side door and got back into the car. He was breathing heavily and sweating profusely, so he sat quietly and mopped his brow with his sleeve.
A few minutes later later, the driver reappeared with a can of gasoline, poured it into the old car's gas tank, opened his door, and asked Ebenezer, "Did you enjoy your time in the forest?" Ebenezer lied and said that he had, surprised that the driver had not noticed his state of exhaustion. "Notice anything odd?" asked Ebenezer, hoping that the answer would be "No". Instead, the driver asked, "What do you mean?" "Oh, nothing," said Ebenezer, breathing a silent sigh of relief. It would be a shame to be booted from the agency before getting a chance to use his superpowers for the good of mankind.
Before long, they arrived at the hotel. Ebenezer got his bag from the trunk, gave the driver a generous tip, and entered the lobby. Taking a good look around, he thought to himself, "I guess they do celebrate Halloween over here. Boy-oh-boy, do they EVER!" The decorations in the lobby were almost beyond belief. There were bats, werewolves, jack-o'-lantern's, witches, skeletons, ghosts, goblins - you name it, they had it. Ebenezer was truly bowled over by the macabre spectacle. He stood staring at it in awe for several minutes, unable to tear his eyes away.
Finally, he approached the front desk. Behind the counter stood a tall, gaunt man with grayish skin and sunken eyes set within a face that could fairly be described as ghoulish. He nevertheless stood erect, strikingly formal in both manner and dress, with his nose in the air. Moving slowly and deliberately, he turned his attention to Ebenezer. "Good evening," he said with a somewhat sinister tone. "Welcome to the Castle Dragonia. How may I help you?"
"Great ambiance!" gushed Ebenezer. "You folks have outdone yourselves! I wasn't sure that you even celebrated Halloween in Dragonia, but obviously you do." The unsmiling clerk gave him a curious look and repeated the word, "Halloween?" Ebenezer dismissed the response with a flippant, "Oh, never mind," figuring that the Dragonians must have another name for the holiday. "My name is Ebenezer McGeezer, from America, and I have a reservation," he continued. "Ah, yes, Mr. McGeezer," said the clerk, "we have been expecting you. I trust that your journey here was a good one. We have prepared one of our finest rooms for you."
The clerk took Ebenezer's information, scanned his credit card, had him sign the register, and handed him an old-fashioned skeleton key. "R-r-r-r-r-r-room thirteen," he said, rolling the "R" in dramatic fashion. Then, pointing a long, bony finger toward an ornate staircase, he added, "It's at the top of the stairs, the first door on your right."
Ebenezer thanked the clerk and made his way across the lobby. As he ascended the stairs, every step creaked under foot. "Wow," he thought, "they've even installed Halloween sound effects!" And then he noticed that the paintings on the wall had an interesting quality to them. The eyes of the people in the paintings all seemed to be following him as he climbed the stairs. It felt wonderfully creepy and Ebenezer wondered how they were able to create that effect.
As he reached the top of the stairs, he turned around to view the lobby from above. "Spectacular!" thought Ebenezer. "I am really going to enjoy my stay here. I can feel it in my bones!"
When he reached the door to his room, Ebenezer inserted the key and turned it. The door creaked as it opened and some air rushed out of the room. It felt cold and - what was it, exactly? - malevolent in some weird, indefinable way. "Cool!" thought Ebenezer. "I wonder how they create that effect?"
As he stepped into the darkened room, he heard and felt something crunch under his foot, but dismissed it too as part of the Halloween theme. He searched in vain for a light switch, then wondered if there might be a lamp or a string suspended from an overhead light. As he stumbled around the room searching for some way to turn on a light, every step resulted in the same kind of crunch as the first one had. Ebenezer wondered again what it was. "Could it be a carpet of bubble wrap?" he thought.
Ebenezer finally located a lamp and turned it on. Looking down, he saw a floor crawling with bugs, most running frantically from the light. More than a few of their cousins had been crushed into shoe-shaped patches wherever Ebenezer had stepped. "Yuck!" exclaimed Ebenezer, who bolted for the door.
Unfortunately, a strong gust of wind blew through the open window at that exact moment, causing the door to slam shut. Then he heard the door lock. Then he saw that there was no way to unlock the door from the inside. And then came the coup de grace - the light went out.
"OK," thought Ebenezer, "I enjoy Halloween as much as anyone, but this has gone too far." Unable to open the door, he reached into his pocket for his cell phone to call the front desk. Discovering that there was no cell service, he remembered having read somewhere that there was no cell service anywhere in Dragonia. After a moment of reflection, he decided to draw attention to his predicament the old fashioned way, by screaming for help at the top of his lungs. His howling, alas, brought no one to his rescue. Once again, Ebenezer was tempted to use his superpower, but could he do it without compromising his secret identity? After considering the question for several minutes, he decided that he probably could get away with it. "First," he thought, "I will clear the room of bugs and then I will open that door."
Ebenezer recorded himself saying "That's nothing to sneeze about!" on his otherwise useless cell phone. Playing it back, he suddenly felt the urge to sneeze. And sneeze he did, sweeping every bug in the room out the open window. Rushing to the window, he quickly slammed it shut. Then he turned his attention to the door. Playing the recording once again, he directed the power of the inevitable sneeze at the door, splintering it into a thousand pieces. "Uh-oh," thought Ebenezer, "I guess I overdid it a bit. That's going to be difficult to explain." Nevertheless, he was happy to be free of his room.
When he complained to the desk clerk about the conditions in his room, Ebenezer was told that no other rooms were available. He was also told that the cost of the door would be added to his bill. "How exactly," asked the clerk, "did you manage to smash the door to bits like this?" "Oh, I don't know," replied Ebenezer, "I guess I just don't know my own strength." "Alright," said the exasperated clerk, "I will have maintenance install a new door." Then, as he wandered back down the stairs, Ebenezer could see him shaking his head and heard him muttering to himself, "Crazy Americans!"
While the new door was being installed, Ebenezer decided to go for a swim in the pool, which was located in the basement where the castle's old dungeon used to be. He was pleased to see that the character of the old dungeon had been carefully preserved, with stone walls and rusty old metal doors, manacles, chains, and other items everywhere. And there, right in the middle of it all, was a modern Olympic-sized swimming pool.
Ebenezer had the pool entirely to himself, so he climbed to the top of the diving board and did a cannonball dive into the deep end. Then he began swimming laps, an activity that he found relaxing and that also would also help to keep him in shape during his vacation. On his third lap, he suddenly felt a sharp pain in one of his big toes. Rolling over onto his back, he lifted his head out of the water and saw a patch of red spreading around his feet. "Blood!" thought Ebenezer, "But how could that happen out here in the middle of the pool?" Then he noticed a small fish, and then another, and another, and another - a whole school of them. Then, horrified, he realized what they were.
Piranhas! The pool was full of piranhas, a small but aggressively predatory species of fish native to the Amazon River in South America. Working together, they are capable of stripping the flesh from any large animal unlucky enough to wander into the water in just a matter of minutes. They have very sharp teeth and they attack in waves. Ebenezer knew right away that he was in big trouble.
He began swimming for his life, but knew that he could not outswim these pesky little predators. In desperation, he took a deep breath and raised his head out of the water so that he could shout "That's nothing to sneeze about!" and then listen for it to echo off the old dungeon walls. It did, of course, and Ebenezer felt that old familiar urge to sneeze. Plunging his head into the water, he unleashed an underwater sneeze that blasted nearly all of the water - and the piranhas - out of the pool. As it splashed up against the dungeon walls, Ebenezer found himself standing at the bottom of the pool in about three inches of water. It quickly came pouring back in, and with it the piranhas, so Ebenezer calmly clambered out of the pool. It was time to lodge another complaint at the front desk.
The desk clerk was not at all surprised to hear about the piranhas. "During the day, they are kept in a small aquarium in the dining room, but after midnight we put them in the pool with a side of beef to feed them and give them a chance to exercise. After midnight", he said pointedly, "the pool is closed to our guests. Didn't you see the sign?"
"Oh," replied Ebenezer, "I did see a sign, but it was in Dragonian, not English, so I just assumed that it was about standard pool etiquette." The desk clerk had turned the tables on Ebenezer, who found himself in the awkward position of having broken the hotel's pool rules. He apologized profusely and had to slink away in embarrassment. Returning to his room, he found that the door had been repaired, so he bandaged his toe and went straight to bed. Exhausted from his long day, he slept like a baby.
In the morning, as Ebenezer passed the fish tank in the dining room, he noticed that the piranhas seemed to be following him. They looked almost as hungry as he felt and it gave him the shivers.
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The Adventures of Sneezer McGeezer
Madame Lasagna
Ebenezer McGeezer had a perfectly normal childhood. Oh, sure, some of the kids at school made fun of his name, as kids often do, tagging him with the nickname "Scrooge" after the character Ebenezer Scrooge in the Charles Dickens story "A Christmas Carol." But, being a good-natured kid, Ebenezer took it all in stride and was popular with his classmates. He was a good student, a pretty decent athlete, and he played the tuba in the high school band. In other words, his life was pretty normal.
After graduating from high school, young Ebenezer enrolled at a nearby college to study engineering. Then one day a travelling carnival arrived in a nearby town and started setting up for the county fair. And, as luck would have it, Ebenezer and a couple of his friends, Iggy Schwartz and Joey Chung, decided to visit the carnival one evening. It was a decision that would change the course of young Ebenezer's life forever.
As they wandered the grounds, they came upon a fortune teller billing herself as Madame Lasagna. Her name made Ebenezer and his friends laugh, so they decided to have their fortunes read. None of them believed in this fortune-telling hocus-pocus, of course, but they all thought that it would be good for a laugh or two.
"Welcome, " said Madame Lasagna as they entered the darkened tent. "What can I do for your boys?"
"We'd like to have our fortunes read," said Ebenezer, and the other boys nodded in silent agreement.
"OK," responded Madame Lasagna. "Who wants to go first?"
"I will," answered Iggy. "I'm pretty sure that I have a bright future ahead of me."
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