The Mayor, the hat man and his wife

Sovereign meeting the people

‘Let’s get this straight, you think you’re wife here should have my job?’ said the Mayor.

‘Yeah I do,’ said the man with the hat. ‘Thing is, she may not look it, but she’s a dynamo.’

‘A dynamo?’

‘Yeah.’

‘D’you mind not talking about me as if I wasn’t here,’ said the wife of the man with the hat.

‘See, I told ya,’ said the hat man.

‘I’m sorry,’ said the Mayor. ‘I’m just taken aback here. I feel insulted to be honest with you.’

‘Insulted?’ said the hat man.

‘Insulted?’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘Yeah.’

‘Why ?’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘Well come on. I mean, here I am trying to be nice. I’m walking around, chatting with people, trying to find out what they want…’

‘Well, yeah but…’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘I’ve only been in the job for 5 days…’

‘I know but…’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘And this schmuck…’

‘Hey!’ said the hat man.

‘How dare you!’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘I don’t think he meant anything by that,’ said the Mayor’s aide.

‘Didn’t mean anything,’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘Just be a man,’ said the hat man.

‘Be a man? Be a goddamn man!’ said the Mayor.

‘I’m glad I didn’t vote for you…’ said the hat man’s wife.

‘Well, thank you but I didn’t need your vote and frankly…’

‘Mr Mayor…’

‘If anyone’s a schmuck…’ said the hat man brandishing his umbrella.

‘Sir, move away,’ said the Mayor’s security man grasping the umbrella.

‘You make me wanna puke,’ said the hat man’s wife. ‘Come on dear, we didn’t come here to be insulted. ‘

Gallumptia

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The town of Gallumptia, Idaho, was in many ways an idyllic and peaceful town. The population was only two thousand and there was plenty of room for everyone. Although the  houses varied, no one really had it bad. The Mayor, of course had he grandest house, with more than 100 acres of land, mostly forest, overlooking the river Gallump. The bank manager too had a massive house, three floors and 22 bedrooms and a lake as big as a small sea. No one minded, there was little jealously in Gallumptia because even the lowliest of townspeople, and lets be honest, Jack Hardacre was definitely the lowest, with his limp, his dimwittedness and his unusual shaped head, even Jack  had it pretty good.

He had a modest house with a modest garden and a substantial orchard where he grew the most delicious apples. Even though he was a bit unsightly, the good townspeople of Gallumptia frequently visited him, especially around September time when the apples started to ripen.

He didn’t mind that they only loved him for his apples, better than not having any attention was how he thought about it. He changed his mind though the year he had a bad crop, hardly anything edible and once word got round the stream of visitors almost immediately turned to a dribble and within a week, no one came at all.

He thought he wouldn’t mind but he was incredibly hurt by this and vowed to get his revenge on the fickle folk of Gallumptia.

Gallumptia, though beautiful, was remote. The nearest town was two hundred and fifty miles away and only the mayor and the bank manager had cars. They’d become very good at self sufficiency and hardly needed anything from anywhere. The exception to this was sugar. They all had a sweet tooth, they all loved their desserts and biscuits and tea with 3 sugars and luckily they had 6 dentists in the town so it wasn’t really a problem.  People were happy, mostly quite fat, but happy anyway, apart that was from Jack Hardacre.

He felt that he needed to share his unhappiness around a bit and come November after seething for a few weeks about his lack of apple inspired visitors, he hatched a plan. Took him a bit longer than most, what with his dimwittedness and all, but in the end the plan was simple and effective.

That night he stole the petrol tanker from Hank Jackson’s yard. He knew it was full because Hank always got back late after filling up and didn’t set off on his rounds until early Tuesday mornings, even dim old Jack knew this. It was small town, everyone knew everyone’s business.

He drove straight to the sugar tank and proceeded to pump a load of petrol in the top, ruining all the sugar.

He drove back to Hank’s, left the tanker, walked home and slept a contented sleep for the first time in weeks.

The mayor got the first call, he called the grocer and the bakers and the whole town soon knew what had happened. That night there was a crisis meeting. People shouted and screamed at the mayor demanding that he come up with a plan. Most of them had only a few days of sugar left…

To be continued