On MECHANICAL BULL

March 6th
On MECHANICAL BULL

Once upon a time there was a tiny village in Bavaria. In this village there lived the largest woman in the world and the smallest man in the world, who were due to be wed in a hilltop wedding on a summer’s day. Everyone in the village, whose population was 300, was invited to the wedding, and they had all made fine suits and dresses for the occasion in traditional Bavarian style.
When the day of the wedding came, the largest woman in the world, whose nam was Petunia, started walking down the aisle, with all the men and women and children of the village looking back at her from their out-of-doors chairs that had been arranged on the hilltop. The world’s smallest man, whose name was Gerald, was smoking a cigarette happily and remarking to the priest on how beautiful his bride was as she strode thundrously down the makeshift aisle.
All of a sudden, a mechanical roar was heard and people started to flee in terror. A 20-foot-tall mechanical bull, made of chrome steel with copper eyes, golden horns and bronze haunches, hurled itself into the wedding area, tossing people this way and that. It finally hoisted Petunia up; delivering her neatly into a compartment that opened up in its back, and ran off into the dark woods.
Gerald immediately ran after her and the bull, still wearing his best suit. And smoking a cigarette, so short that it threatened to set aflame his neatly trimmed moustache. The woods were very frightening to such a tiny man, but he was able to evade any passing dinosaurs by hiding under a bushel. Soon he came upon a gluten-free gingerbread house, where a witch lived.
The witch walked out of the front door of the house.
“Ahhh, Gerard, my sweet!” she cackled, “Come to fetch your fetching wife, I see?”
“You are the one who stole my wife with your mechanical bull?” said Gerard in a German accent.
“Yes,” wailed the witch, “I got a blacksmith/mechanic to make it for me when I kidnapped his wife!”
“Did you give him his wife back when he made it for you?” asked Gerard.
“Yes of course. I always keep my word,” replied the witch, “And have I got a deal for you. All you have to do to get your wife back is these three tasks: fetch for me the oldest bottle of wine in the world, the tastiest pizza in the world, but make sure it is gluten free, and also kill the world’s smartest dog!”
Gerard narrowed his eyes thoughfully. “I will do as you request,” he said.
“Good!” said the witch wartily, “I’ll wait here in my front yard until you return.
Gerard walked down the path through the woods, and then cut through the woods in a circular pattern so that he approached the gluten-free gingerbread house from the other side. He didn’t mind fetching the wine and pizza, but killing dogs was beyond the pale as far as he was concerned. Furthermore, if it was the smartest dog in the world, it might be on the brink of curing cancer or something, and he didn’t want that on his conscience.
So he snuck in through a gumdrop window on the back side of the house. True to her word, the witch was patiently waiting in her front yard. The mechanical bull was fast asleep in the centre of the cottage, and Gerard could hear his wife weeping inside of it. Gerard looked around the cottage, and found a rope, an oil can, several boxes of unopened Mentos, a gun, a wrench, a photo album, a jar of ooze, a hieroglyphics-to-German dictionary, a half-eaten gluten-free sandwich, eighteen jars of tomato paste, a old VHS copy of Eraser with Arnold Schwartzenegger, and a swastika armband. He took the wrench and loosened all of the nuts on the mechanical bull. Some of them he had to climb pretty high on the bull to loosen, but he was a good climber.
When he was done that, he pulled a bullhorn out of his pocket that he had brought to the wedding just in case, and sounded a mighty noise. The mechanical bull awoke with a start.
“I have three questions-“ the mechanical bull started to say before completely falling apart, allowing Petunia to escape. Gerard clambered up on Petunia’s back and Petunia walked right through the back wall of the gluten-free gingerbread house. They ran all the way back home to the village, and were married for good the very next day. They were married for 70 years, and to this day that witch is still in her front yard waiting for the return of Gerard, as good as her word.