Statistical Mechanics
"Okay, so I hereby call this planning meeting to order."
"You don't need to officially do that, Ted."
"Why not. It's coming to order. I feel we should be calling it to order. Just to, you know, point it out. And get everyone to settle down."
"All right, fine, Ted. Thanks. Now sit down."
"Okay, let me just get my coffee."
"Anyway. Our big topic for discussion this week will be the Spring pagent we put on, every year, for the kids of the surrounding town. Yes? Linda? You don't have to raise your hand, you know."
"Oh. Didn't realise. Can we do the Passion this year? It's very hot, what with Mel's film and all..."
"Nope. Remember what happened last time we did the Christmas pagent? We got shut down because of those overt Christian references. So we're going to have to skip that. I was thinking maybe we could do something about the May Pole. You know, have the kids dancing and everything.. frolicking, almost. That might be nice."
"Look, but maybe we could slip in some symbolic references to the Passion. You know, on the sly. A cross here, a little crown of thorns on one of the frolicking kids. Maybe some pieces of silver."
"I'm not giving my son any pieces of silver."
"Well, it doesn't have to be your son, Bill, my son would be a fine Judas..."
"I'm not giving your son any pieces of silver."
"All right, look, settle down. Ted, stop looking so smug, I'm not calling anything to order. Yes? Linda?"
"Isn't the May Pole about sex? Celebrating the sexual act? We might get sued. Or imprisoned, if we use children. Can you imagine?"
"This isn't because we nixed your Passion idea, is it?"
"No! It's just... it's about sex. There you go. Sex, kids. Sex & kids, sex slash kids. Bad idea. Remember that Autumn 'Birds and the Bees' thing we tried to do for the twelve year olds a couple years ago? "Too soon, too sexy," "Bondage pictures are off-limits," all the comments we got. It wasn't pleasant."
"All right, fine, no May Pole. How about Solstice? Spring/Summer Solstice, obviously, not Winter. Something nice, with maybe "
"Aww. Not the hippies again."
"What, Ted? What is it?"
"It's just the hippies. They always give us such a hard time for getting it wrong all the time. And, well, they kind of stink. Now, I know, Carol, your parents are, were, sort of hippy-ish, but they smelled, we all have to admit it. Come on, we do. Okay, maybe we don't. But I'm saying it."
"Okay. So. What'll it be, then? Do we just do a bakesale?"
"How about a nice, non-denominational sort of parade? With flowers and... chickens. Small chickens. That little children carry in baskets. That way it's sort of Easter, without all the crucifying and thorns and stuff? We can call it..."
"Merry Chicken Day!"
"Ehm, I suppose. I was thinking more... Spring-a-Day, but sure."
"Excellent. Well, from the murmurs, I'm guessing everyone's pretty happy with that. Great. Well, if you guys can figure out how to re-use a lot of those sheep costumes and shepherd crooks we've got from the Christmas "Let's Celebrate Grecian Shepherds" festival; we held, that'd be great, because we've got no budget, really, for anything more. And if anyone's got chickens to donate, that'd be pretty good, too."
disclaimer:
Enjoy this week, you guys, you faithful reader-types, thanks a million for all your reading. Diligent reading, I hope. That's why we leave the typos in, after all.
Have a chocolate malt shake for us.
And remember to floss, always remember to floss.