So, thanks to the way parallel universes work, there is a vent in my apartment through which I can throw just about anything and have that thing make its way to Colonel Sanders, and not just our universe’s Colonel Sanders, but a Colonel Sanders with power over, among other things, the weather, who goes to Hell when they die, and the outcome of game shows which rely upon a minimal degree of chance (in that universe, Colonel Sanders is powerless against the whims of chance). How do I know all this? It’s a long story, but the short version is that sometimes a deep Kentucky baritone yells back at me when I send my latest volley of aquarium rocks hurtling down the air conditioning intake/wormhole.
A few weeks ago, I began throwing birds into the vent. Semi-conscious birds. Birds who had just crashed into the large, well-polished sheet of plexiglass I carry around local parking lots as a prank on birds. They aren’t dead. I make sure of that. I check which ones are dead and I throw those into a different vent in which they reanimate and come back to a parallel-universe Paula Abdul as dinosaurs who like to wear tuxedos and wait tables. No, I take the semi-conscious ones. The ones just waking up. And I throw them into the vent which leads to Colonel Sanders, specifically a Colonel Sanders who is powerless before the dictates of luck.
Uh oh, just started to rain.
As I said, I started doing this a few weeks ago. Since then, I have heard nothing from Colonel Sanders. That’s why I’m concerned. Has he found the birds? Have the birds found him? What’s going on down there? Why is the man with the mustache downstairs giving me such furious looks when I exit the building carrying my plexiglass bird-catcher?
I’ll keep you posted. As I said, though, it just started to rain.
