(GK: Garrison Keillor; SS: Sue Scott: TR: Tim Russell, RD: Rich Dworsky)
GK: ........this portion of our show brought to you by the Ketchup Advisory Board.
(MUSIC)
TR: These are the good years for me and Barb. Barb's father was inducted into the Masons and the invocation ceremony was mercifully cut short by a bomb threat. I was called to serve jury duty and I discovered that if I let saliva trickle out of the side of my mouth they let me go home. Jim Jr. fell in love with a foreign exchange student and due to visa complications, he has to serve two years in the Swiss Army. And these terrible neighbors of ours suddenly found the police at their door asking about the grow lights in their basement and the tinfoil over the windows.
We should have been happy. And then late one night I found Barb sitting up and chugging on a bottle of Creme de Menthe - Honey, what's wrong?
SS: Oh, Jim. I was at the eye doctor's today and he says that years of TV watching have left me with the eyesight of a Welsh coal miner. The other day I walked into a closet and looked for the Down button.
TR: Have you tried cutting your bangs? Maybe all you need is a haircut.
SS: No, Jim. I need glasses. And worse, I need bifocals. Bifocals, Jim! I'll look like somebody's substitute teacher. I'll look like somebody about to be committed to senior care.
TR: They have bifocals with no tell-tale line, Barb. Nobody will know.
SS: I'll know, Jim! The opthalmologist gave me a bill, Jim. It was in extra large type.
TR: I think you're seeing your glasses as half-empty, Barb. Bifocals will give you a look of authority.
SS: Yes, the kind that shoe repairmen have. Oh, Jim. Everything is starting to go south. Maybe I should get that laser eye surgery. Marlene had it and she said it's no worse than being poked with a sharp stick.
TR: A laser's not the answer, Barb.
SS: No?
TR: Technology developed for warfare against Martian invaders is nothing you should put in your eye. You're just not getting enough ketchup. Ketchup has natural mellowing agents that help a person adjust to the inevitable physical decline that comes in later life.
SS: Oh, Jim.
TR: How about we get out the ketchup right now, Barb?
RD: These are the good years, beneath the clear blue skies,
Sunlight reflected on the lenses of our eyes,
Life is flowing like ketchup on the fries
GK: Ketchup. For the good times.
RD: Ketchup... ketchup...
© Garrison Keillor 2002