THE CURSE
               Copyright (C) 1987-1995 Ted Holden


When Barney Johnson woke up the next morning, he saw to his
horror that there was a 15 mm bolt where his belly-button had
been.  "Gotta be a bad dream", he figured, but it was no dream. 
Along about 8:45 that evening, Barney started to believe it; 
bad dreams didn't last that long.  Barney went out to his garage
and opened the drawer in his tool box which contained wrenches. 
However, Barney now discovered that 15 mm is one of the odd
sizes amongst metric nuts and bolts;  no American size wrench
exactly matches up with 15 mm and the bolt was hardened steel. 
Barney stripped both of his 5/16 wrenches trying to turn the
bolt off and had nothing to show for his troubles other than a
wrenching stomach ache.  

Barney began to realize that he had a problem;  this was 1959
and hardly anyone in America had metric tools, especially in
Michigan.  Barney went to several of the hardware stores around
Flint and got the same answer each time:  "Nah, we don't carry
metric tools here Mr. Johnson...  What'd ya do, go out and buy
yourself some kind of a communist car or something?"  

Barney next went to a little automotive garage operated by his
brother-in-law, Ed.  "Looks like you done messed with some
people you shouldn't have", said Ed, choosing a large adjustable
Crescent wrench off of a work-bench.  The adjustable wrench was
able to get a solid purchase on the bolt, but the bolt wouldn't
budge;  Ed almost flipped Barney trying to turn the bolt out. 
"Looks like that sucker's gotta be heated before it's gonna come
off", said Ed, reaching for a butane torch, but Barney thanked
him and left.

Barney went to faith-healers, automotive garages,
chiropractors, spiritualists, orthopedists, stomach
specialists... but to no avail.  And he drove near and far to
neighboring cities and towns looking for metric tools in the
hardware and automotive stores, also in vain.  By the time a
year had rolled around, Barney had become the laughing stock of
Flint and all of the surrounding areas, and was pretty close to
committing suicide.  

But, on the very same night, exactly one year after the
inception of the curse, Barney had a dream in which his fairy
godfather, wearing a lacy and low-cut, blue satin dress, told
him that help was on its way; that a good set of metric wrenches
would arrive on the morrow.  And so they did;  in a package
marked air-mail with Barney's name and address and, in the upper
left corner where return addresses normally go, an insignia in
Cyrillic characters reading: "Ot Rossii s'luboviu" which Barney
couldn't read but which, of course, meant: "From Russia with
Love."

Back in the USSR, Marshall Petrov was questioning the great
shaman over the phone:  "What happens when he turns the bolt
out, Dr. Houlihan?"  

"You saw what happened to the CAR when I turned that bolt out",
said Teb.  "It's rear-end fell off...  Same thing'll happen to
the farmer."  

"No shit!!", replied Petrov.

One of the local farmers sought the wisdom of Madame Zifone,
Flint Michigan's Gypsie spiritualist, several days later.  "You
know, I've always hated that Barney Johnson", he said, "and two
days ago I thought I saw a chance to really kick his but, I mean
LITERALLY;  Barney was bending over lifting a sack of fertilizer
over in front of Al's store and I took my best shot, just like a
place-kick, and MISSED!!!!!."  "I mean I don't NEVER MISS!?? 
Four years of major college ball and two years playing for the
Browns before that knee injury and I never even had a ball go
off my foot sideways!??"  "I'da thought Barney wouldda laughed,
but he just walked off with a kinda nervous look on his face
like somethin was the matter."  "I mean, I can't be losin my aim
that bad yet, I'm only forty."

Madame Zifone replied "You're not losing your touch, Eddie, but
that particular kind of thing almost died clean off the earth in
the middle ages.  The only man on earth right now who knows how
to do anything even remotely like that's in Russia;  whatever
could old Barney Johnson possibly have done to get anybody that
far away pissed off at him?"  

"Maybe shot one of their cars?", replied Eddie.         The farmers
began to say, "You know, that Barney Johnson used to be
half-assed, but now he ain't got no ass at all.  Shouldn't mess
with them Russians unless you know what you're doin...  Oughta
leave that kinda business to the army." 

Believe it or not, Ralph broke out of his slump.  He began to
be able to tell Molly's sports car imitations from real sports
cars and finally seized the parrot and shook her silly;  it was
several days before Molly could speak coherently again and
several months before all of her green feathers grew back. 
Ralph began chasing chickens, then sheep, and then cattle, which
ran from him to humor him, and finally began chasing tractors,
combines, and the various kinds of farm vehicles which abounded
in the area.  

As for Barney Johnson, it is possible to say that some forms of
nerd-dom are curable and that, occasionally, determination will
allow one to rise above such a defeat as has been related;  more
will be said of him later.