MiSTed: The Tale of Fatty Raccoon, Chapter XVII (1 / 1)

[Joseph Nebus]

> XVII

MIKE: I usually take a 2XVII but I've been feeling light lately.

>
> FATTY FINDS THE MOON

TOM: Not *that* The Moon, mind you. A different The Moon.

>
> Wandering through the woods one day,

CROW: In the very merry month of ... December.

> Fatty Raccoon's bright eyes
> caught a strange gleam from something---something that shone and
> glittered out of the green.

MIKE: Oh yeah, it's Gleam Squirrel season.

> Fatty wanted to see what it was,

TOM: Raccoon laser eyes on.

> though he
> hardly thought it was anything to eat.

TOM: Oh. Raccoon laser eyes off, then.

> But whenever he came upon
> something new he always wanted to examine it. So now Fatty hurried to
> see what the strange thing was.
>
> It was the oddest thing he had ever found---flat, round, and
> silvery;

CROW: Fatty discovers his first flying saucer.

> and it hung in the air, under a tree, just over Fatty's head.

MIKE: A shower head?
TOM: Jeez, there's got to be nicer ways to tell him to take a bath.

> Fatty Raccoon looked carefully at the bright thing. He walked all around
> it, so he could see it from all sides.

MIKE: So someone hung a half-dollar from a tree?

> And at last he thought he knew
> what it was. He made up his mind that it was the moon!

TOM: Oh, yeah, I can see where --- *what*?

>
> He had often seen the moon up in the sky;

MIKE: Okay, yeah, sky, that checks out.

> and here it was,
> just the same size exactly,

CROW: *Exactly*?
TOM: I think Fatty's one of those people who doesn't believe you can see the moon during the day.


> hanging so low that he could have reached
> it with his paw.

MIKE: 'Could have'. Big talk there, Fatty.

> He saw nothing strange in that; for he knew that the
> moon often touched the earth.

CROW: Fatty studied astronomy at an un-accredited college.

> Had he not seen it many a time, resting
> on the side of Blue Mountain?

TOM: Uh ... all right, Counselor, I'll let this continue but you're on a short leash.

> One night he had asked his mother if he
> might go up on the mountain to play with the moon; but she had only
> laughed.

CROW: [ As Mrs Raccoon ] 'The Moon is a cow place. We raccoons have Toronto.'

> And here, at last, was the moon come to him!

TOM: This is so awkward because The Moon's meeting someone else there.

> Fatty was so
> excited that he ran home as fast as he could go, to tell his mother,
> and his brother Blackie, and Fluffy and Cutey, his sisters.

MIKE: And Jimmy Rabbit's imaginary brother.

>
> "Oh! the moon! the moon!" Fatty shouted.

CROW: Tattoo's catchphrase for _Fantasy Island: 1999_.

> He had run so fast
> that, being so plump, he was quite out of breath. And that was all he
> could say.

MIKE: He's thinking of making Moon Pies and ... Moon cakes ...

>
> "Well, well! What about the moon!" Mrs. Raccoon asked.

TOM: Moon salad, Moon pudding ...
CROW: Moon sausages? ... I don't know, this category's stumped me.


> "Anybody
> would think you had found it, almost." And she smiled.

CROW: Is ... is 'you found the moon' some 1915 slang or something?
MIKE: [ Shrugs ]

>
> Fatty puffed and gasped. And at last he caught his breath
> again.
>
> "Yes---I've found it! It's over in the woods---just a little way
> from here!" he said.

TOM: And up a considerable bit!

> "Big, and round, and shiny!

CROW: Huh ... well, that sounds like the Moon, sure.

> Let's all go and
> bring it home!"

MIKE: Oh, I don't know. You never play with that Ceres you brought home last year.

>
> "Well, well, well!" Mrs. Raccoon was puzzled. She had never heard
> of the moon being found in those woods;

TOM: Oh, now our woods aren't good enough for the Moon?

> and she hardly knew what to
> think. "Are you sure?" she asked.

CROW: Have you checked it for any identifying Apollo landing sites?

>
> "Oh, yes, Mother!" Fatty could hardly wait, he was so eager to
> lead the way.

TOM: He's going to be so embarrassed when he gets back and it's just Pluto.

> And with many a shake of the head, Mrs. Raccoon, with her
> family, started off to see the moon.

MIKE: This reminds her of the time Fluffy brought home a Lesser Magellanic Cloud.

>
> "There!" Fatty cried, as they came in sight of the bright,
> round thing.

CROW: Oh, that's not the Moon, that's just Callisto.

> "There it is---just as I told you!" And they all set up a
> great shouting.

TOM: Finally a Raccoon Moon.
MIKE: Man in the Moon wearing in eye mask.

>
> All but Mrs. Raccoon. She wasn't quite sure, even yet, that Fatty
> had really found the moon.

CROW: If this is the Moon why does it have a sticker saying Made In Queens?

> And she walked close to the shining thing
> and peered at it. But not too close!

MIKE: Screen falling off the door, door hanging off the hinges ...

> Mrs. Raccoon didn't go too near it.
> And she told her children quite sternly to stand back.

TOM: Don't want you to get scrooched by mistake.

> It was well
> that she did; for when Mrs. Raccoon took her eyes off Fatty's moon and
> looked at the ground beneath it---well!

CROW: Wait, that's no moon ...

> she jumped back so quickly that
> she knocked two of her children flat on the ground.

CROW: It's a space station!

>
> A trap!

CROW: It's a trap?!
MIKE: Subverted expectations.


> THAT was what Mrs. Raccoon saw right in front of her.

TOM: Sharp eyes on Mrs Raccoon.
MIKE: She learned from that time she tried to bring home Saturn's rings.

> And
> Farmer Green, or his boy, or whoever it was that set the trap,

CROW: Like there's another person in the story?
MIKE: [ Shaking his fist ] Jasper Jay!

> had
> hung that bright piece of TIN over the trap hoping that one of her
> family would see it and play with it---and fall into the trap.

TOM: The trap of carrying your old-timey tintype photograph around the amusement park all day.

> Yes---it
> was a mercy that Fatty hadn't begun knocking it about. For if he had
> he would have stepped right into the trap and it would have shut---SNAP!

CROW: Jeez, who tries to trap a perfectly innocent Moon?

> Just like that. And there he would have been, caught fast.

TOM: All right he'd be trapped, sure, but he'd have a Moon, too.

>
> It was no wonder that Mrs. Raccoon hurried her family away from
> that spot.

CROW: What can I say? This house is falling apart.

> And Fatty led them all home again. He couldn't get away
> from his moon fast enough.

MIKE: Leaving the trap as a little surprise for Brownie Beaver there.

>
>

--
Joseph Nebus
Math Blog: https://nebusresearch.wordpress.com
Humor Blog: https://nebushumor.wordpress.com
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