844. Stolen parsley

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844parsley

It annoyed Norma immensely. She had a patch of prolifically growing parsley in a small garden not too far inside her front gate.

The neighbours would frequently come in and steal a bunch of parsley. It’s not that Norma minded about that. They could have as much parsley as they wanted. They just had to ask. “Help yourself whenever,” she would have said.

But they didn’t ask. They would sneak over once it was dark and pinch parsley.

Norma trained her dog to piss on the parsley. It wouldn’t kill the neighbours, but it gave Norma a great deal of satisfaction.

Norma grew another small patch of parsley at the back of her house. That was for her own use. Unbeknown to her, the dog rather fancied that patch as well.

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44 thoughts on “844. Stolen parsley”

    1. Bruce Goodman Post author

      Thank you, Simon, that is indeed praise! It would be interesting to hand copies of the story out to a classroom of students and say “In one sentence write down the moral of the story”. It could well produce a plethora of contradictions!

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      1. simon682

        That would be interesting indeed. Neither of us care too much for the traditional story with an obvious moral (the old school assembly type). I like the way you allow at least twenty possible aphorisms to be drawn from this.

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        1. Bruce Goodman Post author

          Writing down the “message” in one sentence was a technique the old homiletics professor gave us years ago in the seminary. When someone gave a sermon in class we had to write down in one sentence what they were saying. The professor would say “Stand up. Say it. Sit down and shut up.” It was the best bit of writing advice (for anything) ever!

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  3. Cynthia Jobin

    This story reminds me of my friend Bill, the waiter, who told me what they do in his restaurant to a sandwich just before serving it to a customer they don’t like.

    Moral: Remember, whatever you teach your dog may come back to bite you.
    Moral II: When a sprig of parsley appears on your plate, consider it a garnish; don’t eat it.

    As Ogden Nash once said: “Parsley is gharsley.”

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  4. thecontentedcrafter

    I am prostrate with grief that my parsley may be peed on!!

    I have glad to say that I have recently taken to growing it in tubs above ground making it difficult for all but a man to piddle on. Do you remember that Bert Munro would pee around his lemon tree, said it made for great lemons……

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      1. thecontentedcrafter

        🙂

        I am forced to go lemonless as the only ones available are US imports – how ridiculous is that? I planted a lemon tree in November in the tiny courtyard – it flowered prolifically and has made many little green nubs of promise – I am hopeful!!

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  5. arlingwoman

    Well, fortunately everyone rinses the parsley. If it isn’t a dog, it could be a rat or some other critter. Re the lemons, Pauline, you could catch and decant your own stuff in there, but that seems a bit of trouble. The lemons often need a couple years to start bearing, but it sounds as though you may be in luck. Goodness. All the stuff I eat directly off the plant in the garden…

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