to snow and the wind came up. "This is absolutely the worst
possible thing that could ever happen," he said. "There's nothing
left." But then he fell and broke his arm. "Well, that's it," he
thought. "This is the worst of all." But as he lay in the snow, a
tree branch broke off and fell on him, breaking both his legs.
"This is worse than the worst," he thought. "But at least nothing
else can happen." But then he heard the sound of wolves coming his
way. The noise was so startling that the man awoke and discovered
that he had been dreaming. "What a dream I had," he said, shaking
himself. "Nothing could be worse."
How Sir Reginald Helped the King
Once upon a time in the kingdom of Plebnia, the king was having a
real problem with his letters to the outlying regions. His messages
always seemed to arrive too late. No matter how early he mailed them,
his Christmas cards arrived in July and his Valentines arrived on
December 24, creating confusion and uncertainty among the people
and giving the Problem Element an excuse to arouse the Rabble
against him.
After some thought, the king had an idea: he would give ten million
greedos (their monetary unit) and the hand of his totally gorgeous
daughter to the person who could make his mail arrive the fastest.
His loyal subjects immediately rushed to solve the problem, setting
themselves to this task with an enthusiasm that an objective observer
might well have described as manic. People ran back and forth, up and
down, muttering, "Move the mail, shove the mail, fling it, sling it.
Run. Hurry. Shoot the mail, toss it, heave it," and such like.
Included in the many and varied offered solutions were proposals to
build a rocket sled, crisscross the countryside with pneumatic tubes,
use fast horses stimulated by strong coffee, borrow a dragster from
the sports arena, set up a reliable airline, make a jet-powered
conveyor belt, or just use ordinary mailmen under the threat of
immediate, violent death if they delayed the mail.
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