People who insist on picking their teeth with their elbows are so annoying!

“What do rabbits and humans have in common?”

I looked at my friend rather perplexed. At first, I didn’t understand his question and then when I took a stab at answering it, I got even more confused. I repeated the question back to him. “Yes,” he replied, “what do rabbits and humans have in common?” I decided not to engage my brain and instead treat the question with the disgust it deserved.

“Nothing!” I replied and then went back to the ham sandwich I was eating and quite enjoying until he had asked me that asinine question.

“Ok,” he replied shrugging his shoulders and taking a bite of his meatloaf sandwich, both of which we had bought at a store that had advertised its one in a kind sandwiches. We had gone in there with the hope of finding something quite unusual, like stork sandwiches or Spanish meatball linguine sandwiches, something we had both eaten in the Belgian Congo many years ago when we visited that country in search of igloos.

We didn’t find those either, even though there was an advertisement in our local rag for cheap igloos in the Belgian Congo. All we found were pools of water and a man dressed in a Scottish kilt standing there with a big grin on his face, flashing all his broken teeth. “Aye, laddie,” he said to me when I asked him where the igloos were, “Aye laddie,” he repeated this time winking at me. “You should’ve come here yesterday. But in this heat, they melt very quickly.”

“When are you getting anymore in?”

He looked at the sun and squinted his eyes. “I dunno,” he answered, “but it’s time for my lunch. Care to join me?” We were both a little jaded, especially when we had spent thousands of dollars flying out to Kinshasa in search of those igloos. We weren’t quite sure what we were in for if we agreed.

“Why?” my friend Robert asked.

“Because,” winked the Scotsman again, he was beginning to get on my nerves. “Because out there yonder they have the best Spanish meatball linguine sandwiches this side of Madrid.” Well, we couldn’t really pass that up and so we accompanied him to a shack with an electric sign on it blinking the words onder Café. The letter Y we thought had fused. The Scotsman, whose name we later found out was Hamish, told us that in the Belgian Congo the electricity rates were really high. The electricity is generated by two men on a bicycle and when one of them is taken sick the other can only generate so much electricity, and obviously it’s not enough to light up the letter Y. Sounded plausible and so we sat down with Hamish who was well known by the natives as Yankee, though he couldn’t explain why. Then a beautiful blonde bombshell walked over to our table and winked at Hamish. “The same as usual, darling?” she asked in a very strong West Indian accent.

“Yes,” he replied, “with a splash of Congo juice please.”

“Small, medium or large?” she asked.

To which he enquired, “what did I have a yesterday?”

“Small,” she replied flicking through her book, “sorry, no, medium,” she corrected herself.

“In which case make it a large.”

“Thanks darling,” she replied blowing him a kiss and then she turned to the two of us. “Are these your friends?” she asked Hamish.

“No,” he replied in his strong Scottish accent, “they’re igloo hunters.”

“Poor things,” she said sounding genuinely sad, “where did you both come from?”

“Germany,” I replied.

“Ireland,” my friend said not wanting to tell them the truth. I stepped in because I was hungry and I was afraid we were going to be thrown out.

“Germany, Ireland,” I added. “He’s from Germany and I’m from Ireland. I stopped on the way here to pick him up.” Sounded plausible. The blonde bombshell in the ill-fitting beach towel, which was quite ok with us, smiled and thanked us for the clarification. She sounded as if she was from Jamaica, but I shook my head.

“And to drink?” she asked.

“Whatever Hamish had.”

“Small, medium or large?”

“Small,” I replied.

Richard added, “large, just like my friend Hamish.”

“One bill or three?”

“Two,” I replied.

Hamish said, “one, he’s paying,” pointing to me and I shrugged my shoulders.

“Found another sucker I see Mr Darling.” And I grinned.

Anyway, we took our sandwiches out onto the balcony of the castle we called home, in the English countryside and watched the majestic swans float by.

“Want to kill one?” asked Richard with mouth full of food.

“No way, Jose,” I replied, “the last time I went to jail for ten days, if you’ve forgotten.”

“Well, that’s only because I told on you. I promise not to do that this time.” I still didn’t agree.

We saw a rabbit come out of a hole and look up at me. It then pulled a watch out of its hidden pocket and looked at the time. “See,” my friend replied, “see, that’s the answer. What do rabbits and humans have in common?”

“Oh, thank goodness!” I replied savouring my horrible sandwich, “I thought you would say something stupid like people who insist on picking their teeth with their elbows are so annoying! Thereby insinuating that rabbits pick their teeth with their elbows.”

My friend rolled his eyes. “Have you ever seen a rabbit pick its teeth, let alone with its elbows?”

“No I haven’t. And neither have I seen people pick their teeth with their elbows either.”

“Then why would you say something that stupid?”

“That’s because you started by asking me what rabbits and humans have in common.”

“And you didn’t get that answer right did you?” I had had enough of my friend for a decade, but I knew I would see him tomorrow because we work in the same clock factory.

“What time do we have to be in for work tomorrow?”

“Ten o’clock!” shouted the rabbit who had made his reappearance. I wish then that I had a rock and good aim, but I didn’t have either.

“Is that a friend of yours?” I asked Richard when the rabbit disappeared down his hole.

“Nope,” he replied and then added, “what do you think of your sandwich?”

“Horrible,” I said, “how’s yours?”

“Horrible as well. We have to stop coming here,” he added.

“The problem,” I replied, “is that it’s the only sandwich store in the town.”

“Should we move?” he asked in all seriousness.

“Where to?”

“The Belgian Congo,” he replied.

“Maybe,” I answered him and the rabbit made another appearance. He was getting on my nerves. “What now?” I asked and he raised his middle toe up at me.

“Friend of yours?” asked Richard.

“Nope,” I replied, “but that’s another thing rabbits and humans have in common.” I got up and left.

“I think I left my tea kettle boiling.”

“I’ll be there in a second,” he replied. “I have a rabbit to kill first.”