A Sardine on Vacation, Episode 10
Pun Pals

The Sardine has his pals, like Frank Weathers, Joe Gillespie, Wal-terr, who might engage one in a serious conversation once in a while. But when looking for the pure solace of intellect, I must turn to someone I've never met. I don't know his or her name, nor do I want to, but we have been corresponding for many years.

We were introduced, so to speak, by a special service for people of intellect and wit: Pun Pals Incorporated, which allows one to engage in the lowest form of friendship and remain anonymous. The anonymity covers the in-bred shame of the punner as if we were speaking in flatulent tongues.

It's a liberating friendship. We ask nothing of each other, save to endure a blue streak of puns. How does such a relationship start? Who gets in the first pun? Do we pun ex vacuo? Nothing's worse than punning to a stranger--the saving grace was that we knew what was expected.

Pun Pals Incorporated anticipated this problem and arbitrarily designated one or the other correspondent to get the ball rolling.

Logged-In Public: The fellows who read the local news on television are very witty.

When they read about the murders, fire, and rapes?

L-I P: No, silly fish. During the happy stuff. Always a great pun to end the broadcast.

The pun must endure many a diurnal newsreader making quip over the daily sludge of news. What the pun accomplishes is the cross pollination of the serious with the absurd and random. The attentiveness to our use of language and all its dangers seems to be missed by those who strictly want to create an effect after the onslaught of the basic horrible of everyday life.

This being said, it must be admitted that the Pun Pal relationship is devoted solely to "effect." For this reason the Sardine chances a few missives throughout the life of the column; the entire correspondence would be too much for outsiders to endure--too much for the participants to do too often. The opening letters should be enough to kill any further appetite for this play on our worse sides.

The first letter supposedly told me his/her background (so I thought; later I shall have to discuss the morality of lying). Living near Los Angeles, my new pal was connected with the entertainment industry.

"I've been working on a TV script. A miniseries. I'd like your opinion, maybe even root me on.

"The Dark Ages. Europe in chaos. Two-bit barbarians need shaves and haircuts. Monks cloistered in monasteries. People moving to the suburbs. No jobs. Serfs up in the hills begging because they have no manors.

"You must admit, there haven't been many movies about this period in history. Why not? Because there's only a few dull lords to write about. At best, a few popes becoming papas. What do we know what happened except for hearsay and heresies. Yawn!

“And stories of King Arthur, most not up to Excalibur. Arthur tabling a few ideas about the Grail of his dreams. Robin not in the 'hood for another couple centuries because there's nothing to rob, and what there is to rob is under lock and key. A bunch of impotent kings, their vassals and knights, and few other royal pissants.

"Yet one man stands out. The main man of the medieval midway with no coeval. Charles the Great. Then or now, people are achen for a hero. A conqueror of conquerors. So don't hit me over the head with Adolph or have a bone to pick with me about Napoleon. Chuck did great with less (or is it fewer?).

"The story starts with granddad, Charles Martel, with a tour of the battle field where he made his name, slamming the invaders from Spain to the ground. Cut to the energetic Pepin, Charles's dad. Frankly, we got to get to Charles fast. What a life! Fifty-two wars. Bring in Alcuin of York to advise and start some school. The whole pic can be narrated by Einhardt.

"Dumb Viking kings vying for kingdoms move into Charlie's turf. A romp into Spain but there's no time to bask in the glory of victory. He had a lot of Gauls to aid him. As his rowdy bunch is rollin', rollin' rollin' into Italy to cut the Lombards to ribbons, he pulls the Pope's vat out of the fire. Eventually our hero avers to run the Avars he has spotted out of Dalmatia.

"All of this leads to his being crowned Emperor in 800 A.D. We'll play up the controversy. Did Pope Leo sneak up and crown Charles or did Chuck up and take the crown from the pope and sitting on the throne put it on his own head?

"I think we can drag this out three nights for three nights on the tube. Charles becomes top dog on the first night. Night two we have the years in power and the wars up to the crowning. Night three contains the later years, the division of his empire, the rumors he's still alive. An epilogue: the treaty of Verdun in 843 marks the end to a grand empire."

My Pun Pal also had an idea for a title and who should play Charlemagne.

"Couldn't we get a thirtyish Robert Wagner-type playing the first half of the docudrama and the older Robert Wagner for the elder statesman trying to keep his heirs fresh and alive? As for the title about this brigand who eventually settles and steals legally: It Takes a Fief."

Nothing ever came of this project, if indeed it were a project beyond exercising puns as someone would test grenades. I have to be careful with his letters and not believe half of what might be true and not take the other half any more seriously.

The Sardine's essays, articles, and stories have appeared around the Internet in the last few years at 3 A.M., Facets, Eclectica magazine, Fiction Funhouse, The Fiction Warehouse, 5_trope, and several film journals. Who and what he is probably will be revealed at various points through the articles appearing at this site. If you want to reach him, his address is popesixtus@aol.com.