LadyChina said:
You had magical garden shears?!!? *envy slides an insidious finger into her happy place, disbelief soon shoves its way in.* AND YOU GAVE THEM AWAY?? You're crazy...
First of all I must emphasize that I did not give them away. I bartered them for a rather valuable piece of scientific research. Besides, given the circumstances under which they were acquired I'm not entirely sure they were … umm … magical … exactly.
You see several weeks ago I was traveling along the main road to meet up with an old friend of mine to discuss a rather delicate business matter involving some Irish sheep farmers and the strange tendency of their flocks to produce wool with a slightly copper toned hue. But, well ... that’s a story for another time.
As you are no doubt aware sheep country is quite a distance from here and I decided to spend the night in a small inn located near the main road above which hung a sign with the words “Chaste Makes Waste Inn”.
I made a mental note to discuss the grammatical inaccuracies of this establishment’s signage with the proprietor but first I needed a hot meal and a cold ale or two.
I entered the inn and had no sooner shaken the dust from my traveling cloak when I was greeted by a rather … well, large woman. Now I don’t want to give you the impression that she was portly or overly round because she had not a feminine curve on her body. She was, in all honesty quite masculine. Right down to the coarse hair on her forearms.
“Looking for something warm stranger?” she asked.
“Aye, and a strong ale to kill the taste.” I replied. This brought a contemptuous scowl to her face but nevertheless I was soon fed and on my way to being well irrigated.
After several mugs of ale (only slightly less bitter than my ex-wife … again a story for another time) and after my complexion had taken on a slightly pink glow by the tavern firelight the stout barmaid took up residence in the seat opposite of mine.
“By the way, I’m Rosetta. You can call me Rose.” She said with a curious twinkle in her eye. “Is there anything else I can do for you? You know … anything … at all?”
“Well there is the matter of your sign. You see it’s … umm … well …”
At this point she began to giggle which shook the entire table and sent generous amounts of my “ex-wife” ale sloshing onto the table top.
“Hmm, I thought as much” she said and then lowered her voice to a mere thunderous whisper.
“You know for a few coin I might be convinced to show you my … umm … magic garden.”
“Magic garden?” I replied. “Why, I’ve never heard of such a thing.”
“Oh, yes. And it's always very nicely trimmed and for just a few coins you can play in it as long as you like.”
“So you charge people to frolic about in your garden?”
“Well, yes, it does pay the bills.”
“And it's trimmed, you say?”
“Well, of course. It's the latest thing. Here, “
With that she produced a tiny pair of scissors from her apron pocket.
“See? Magical shears for a very special, magical garden”
At which point I burst out in uncontrollable laughter.
“What's so funny?” she asked through gritted teeth.
Now if you have ever had just the right amount of ale you can probably recall a moment or two when you almost seemed to be outside of your body watching your own mouth move with no idea what you were about to say.
"Ma'am, no garden, magical or otherwise, large enough to keep food on your table could be trimmed with 100 shears of that size”
“What?!?” she growled.
“Even by an entire village of over-caffeinated dwarves.”
I awoke sometime later lying face down in a ditch just outside of the tavern. It was almost daylight by now and as my head began to clear I noticed a curious pain in my side. I rolled over onto my good side to inspect the damage. The tiny scissors had somehow torn through my mithril chainmail and now sat imbedded between two of my favorite ribs. I extracted them with a grunt and thought. “Hmmph. They just might be magical afterall.”
