To the So-Called Editors,
Flesherton Bugle

Dear Sirs,

Its a good thing my 11-year-old great-great nephew Brandon is typing this up for me as I dictate it to him, because frankly my hands are still too shaky to hold a pen, let alone the glass of sherry that I needed to quell my nerves, and it isn’t even cocktail hour, that’s how alarming this is.

Barely three hours ago I was at the 45th annual Flesherton Art in the Park, which I have attended religiously for 45 years, even that nightmare year where they insisted on a theme, Awesome Abstractions, and half the canvases looked like the roadkill on Highway 12. Give me a lake and a sunset and I’m a happy girl, that’s what I always say, and that year I said it to the organizers but they were too busy trying to put a blue ribbon on a car tire filled with broken dinner plates. “Wreck and Roll” indeed. I even remember the name, thats what a crock the whole thing was. Put the name in quotations, Brandon, thats the way its done.

Like I was saying, I was at the event, which was sponsored BY YOUR NEWSPAPER, make that big letters, Brandon, sweetie, and thoroughly enjoying myself, as always, when I heard the musical entertainment begin, an older gentleman with a  guitar. And as god is my witness… did you capitalize god, Brandon? As God is my witness I could not believe what I heard.

The first song was a lovely ballad about a man wondering if his lady friend would still love him if he was a carpenter, its quite well known, and then he sang another one, also quite pleasant… I’m thinking, Brandon… you’ll have to forgive me, Im still in shock… And then the gentleman offered a new song that he said was an original… called Back Door. It started out quite pleasantly, about a man coming home after a hard day of work, when all of a sudden, I don’t know how to say this and I certainly won’t quote him but he sang a series of lyrics that suggested the man’s intentions towards the woman were not just dishonourable, but frankly, sickening, and I would hope even illegal. At least they were when I was a girl. That was something the sheep did to each other, that’s all I’ll say. Never mind, Brandon. No I will not tell you what it was. Just type what I say, angel. Do they have a way to check the spelling on that machine?

The thing is, he sang so low that no one else seemed to hear what he was saying, and there was even polite applause when he finished. Most of the crowd was milling about the artists tents so I was clearly the only person listening. I was shocked!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But that was nothing compared to the next song, which I swear on my late husband’s grave was all about a man who met TWO women at a corn roast and brought them into the cornfield and… well first of all, corn is for EATING, not… Brandon, would you hand me my sherry dear? You’re not writing down everything I say, are you? And please remove some of those exclamation points I just saw you type up there, please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mmm-mmm, thats better. If a glass of Harveys Bristol Cream cant fix you, nothing can. Well, once again the singer was singing so low, almost incomprehensibly, but I could hear every word. I learned that skill when I was a girl and the farmhands who lodged in our home would sneak out of bed in the middle of the night to visit my sister. But the onlookers at YOUR EVENT, they barely paid attention, or were just so old and deaf and appreciative of some free entertainment that wasn’t that damn choir of retards they bus in from the home every year, that they just applauded like robots, the fools.

Well the worst was yet to come. After the applause for the pornography ended, the singer started introducing another song, again, it seemed like no one else was catching onto him, with a strange ramble about what he called the unique beauty of a mature woman… and HE LOOKED RIGHT AT ME WHILE HE SAID IT… his eyes fixated directly on me as he introduced a brand new song which he called… LOOSE AND LOVELY! For the love of all things decent, there were children there. I had had enough and I turned and left the park and walked home in horror.

IN CONCLUSION, god this sherry is a life saver, I hope that you will take corrective measures over this sick incident immediately, as this sort of spectacle cannot be allowed in our community. It was even more shocking than the time I saw the clown defecating behind the hockey rink at the 1987 Pumpkin Festival. And at least he had the decency to cover it up with a newspaper, most probably yours, as you seem to attract this sort of deviant. Deviant, d-e-v-i-a-n-t. It means… never mind Brandon, Aunt Peg’s tired. And you’re going to let me read this before you send it, right, precious?

Mrs. Peg Walsh
Flesherton

You can buy Jim’s stunning, hilariously fantastic new book, Temporary Libraries here.