Books, Outhouses and Austin’s Statious

Two of my readers stopped by to let us know this column was black and unreadable in last week’s paper. This is a major concern. Was it this way in all of the papers or just two? Have I been censored? Did I say something offensive? Will they take my coffee away? Will I have to get a real job? My solution to this problem was to not submit a column this week. That way the black column and the white one will average out into two columns.

The stories in this column are true. Averett lives a dull life in rural Southside Virginia with his wife Management, two children and a rotating assortment of goats, dogs, cats, snakes and other local fauna.

According to my unofficial poll, this column now has four readers. I am pleased. That is up from two readers last month. Four might not be many, but you have to consider that my readership has doubled in just one month. If this keeps up they might just keep buying my coffee. At this rate I might have a dozen readers next year. I’ll try not to let it go to my head.

I have decided to become a political activist. Usually, I think we have too many laws and rules and that any time a politician proposes a new law, he or she should have to remove two existing ones. When I am King I intend to institute the following law: It shall be a felony punishable by banishment for any person to use a book solely for decoration without consideration of the content. I would also propose a double penalty for using any book I need in my library for such a demeaning purpose.

Tacky people may be bidding against me on books I NEED because of the color. This is more than I can stand. I may put an ad in the paper. FOR SALE: beautiful red books. Then when they show up I’ll lock them in the outhouse, in the BASEMENT of the outhouse.

Speaking of Kipling, I once asked a young lady if she liked Kipling. She replied, “I don’t know. I’ve never kip- pled, but we can try it.” By the time I got back with “Plain Tales from the Hills” she was gone. She probably wouldn’t have liked Kipling anyway.

A friend of mine was working in a home that was going to include a library. Few people demand libraries. We were impressed. Then she mentioned she was having trouble finding books. Well, all of us book lovers understand that and will help in any way we can. When asked what she needed, she replied,“Red and Black.” She just wanted a library to impress her shallow friends.

I was hospitalized to have my eyes “un-bugged out.” I sputtered for days. I could even support the Joan of Arc thing as punishment for wasting books like this. Why doesn’t she just paint book spines on the wall? It’s not like she is ever going to try to read one anyway.

I don’t mind having someone who “needs” a set of books having them. A guy named Joe in California outbid me 6 times on sets of Kiplings. I thought it was great. With this new information I now have to consider there are along the same lines I was once in a home that had a huge and ugly something in the living room. This was not a spouse – it was furniture. I asked what it was and she replied through her nose. This is a genuine stacious. It was made by Austin in the 18th century. I was some fuddled or befuddled or unfuddled or something. I had never heard of a statious. She went on to inform me that an old southern lady of style and breeding identified it and casually dropped the name.

Three days later, it finally clicked and my head almost exploded. When asked, “What would you call this?” The lady had responded in a slow southern drawl, “Well, I’d say it’s ostentatious.”