The tortoise and the hare
This is the epic story of some sort of bizarre animal Olympics in which a turtle and a rabbit are racing each other. Everybody expects the rabbit to win, but the shit hits the fan when he decides to take a nap right before the finish line. The turtle eventually passes him and crosses the finish line first, winning the respect of the entire animal kingdom and establishing turtles as one of the fastest land animals around. Moral: I think the moral of this story is supposed to be that slow and steady wins the race, but the only reason the turtle wins is because the rabbit took a fucking nap. There is no way to apply this to real life.The boy who cried wolf
When a village discovers that their sheep are endangered of being eaten by a wolf, they make the decision to have the precocious, wise-cracking town trouble-maker guard them. Ever the comedian, this kid thinks that it would be a hilarious gag to say that there is a wolf when there really isn’t. Although he is proven correct, the town becomes pissed off at him, especially when he does it a second time. Since this town is full of incompetent idiots, they elect to continue employing this cruel, completely unreliable wretch as their sheep-watcher. The twist is this: When a wolf really does come, nobody listens to the boy, because they think he is up to his old tricks. In the version I’m accustomed to, the wolf is content with just eating the sheep, but I was recently informed that the boy also gets eaten, which was very sad to me, and made me cry for two days.
Moral: If you don’t tell the truth, you will probably die. Also, it might be a good idea to run a quick background check on who you hire to safeguard your town from wolves.
The three little pigs
There’s a wolf cavorting around pigtown, and he wants some bacon. Since most wolves have the magical ability to blow down buildings, this wolf decides to blow down a bunch of pigs’ houses (I don’t know why these pigs are living in houses). One of the pigs is autistic, and he makes his house out of straw, while another pig makes his out of wood, because I guess he wants to live in a cabin. The wolf blows both of these houses down, but he can’t blow down the third pig’s home, because he has built his out of bricks.Moral: If your house is in jeopardy of being blown down by a wolf, you should probably hire somebody to be on the lookout, or at least hire a contractor to reinforce the walls in your home. To avoid further problems, please refer to the previous story.
I think the moral of the three little pigs is more along the lines of "if you're smarter than everybody else, be prepared to be the town fallout shelter." Build a decent house, your idiot brothers are going to come live with you. Have a decent credit score, you're going to get asked for money by that cousin who doesn't really get that credit cards aren't about people lending you stuff until you can afford it (some day).
ReplyDeleteAt least it also teaches that you can take advantage of your none-too-bright relatives' misfortunes to buy the time needed to prepare for the worst. Silver linings.