Once upon a time there lived three Baers. Poppa Baer, Momma Baer, and Baby Baer. The Baers were a rather typical family living in Suburbia. They paid their taxes, they grumbled about their taxes, they voted, they grumbled about who won the election, they went to church, and they hoped Baby Baer would have a better life than they did. And they all were knifeknuts.
None of the Baers ever went anywhere without a knife. Most of the time they just used their knives for the usual stuff like opening envelops, boxes, food packages, whittling sticks, and the like. Momma Baer had an extensive collection of kitchen knives and practiced tactical cooking. She could turn a potato into hash browns so fast that the idea of buying a Ronco Slice-O-matic always brought howls of laughter to everyone in the Baer household whenever one of those lame commercials came on TV. Poppa Baer was a knifemaker. As is common among knifemakers, he was a man of his word, but he actually spoke very few words, preferring to grunt (meaning yes) or bellow (meaning no). Little Baer received his first knife from Grandpa Baer when he was five. He was very fond of making humorous caricatures of the traditional enemies of the Baer family, the infamous Pacifists (they had moved to Suburbia from California).
The Pacifists lived across the street from the Baers. They did not like knives. They did not like guns. They thought the idea of being prepared for anything was actually dangerous. They joined every kind of peaceloving, feel good, namby-pamby, and thoroughly pointless political group you could name. One of their major causes was called Save the World. They tried very hard everyday to irritate people who thought the World would do just fine if people like the Pacifists would stop confusing people into thinking that useful tools like guns and knives were Bad.
Of course, the Baers and the Pacifists were not friendly towards each other. Not surprisingly, the Baers simply wanted to be left alone, but the Pacifists made a point of sending all sorts of folks with various stupid petitions to ban this or that to the Baer's household. They even had Baby Baer's locker at school searched for weapons, but Baby Baer had been taught from a young age to never display your weapons to your enemies unless they were trying to kill you, so baby Baer had his knife concealed, and secured in a custom made Normark concealex sheath under his shirt at the small of his back where nobody could find it.
Anyway, one fine Sunday morning after church, Poppa Baer, Momma Baer, and Baby Baer all went out for a walk in the woods.
Spying out an upstairs window from across the street at the home of the Pacifists was their pride and joy, the incredibly whiney and obnoxious child, Goldilocks. Goldilocks was not a nice person. She hated everyone and everything. She had been taught to believe that unless the world was rid of people like the Baers, the Pacifists and all the other politically correct thinking people would never be safe. So, seeing them go out, she seized the opportunity to run across the street and break into their house in the hopes of finding some sort of illegal weapons or evidence of wrong doing at the Baer home.
She broke one of the windows at the side of the Baer's house and slipped inside. She looked all over, trying to find something to tattle to Mommy and Daddy about. She found a lot of knives and a couple of guns, but the pacifists and those of their ilk had yet to convince enough people that anyone who owned a knife or gun was Obviously dangerous. She looked through their computer records, hoping to find evidence of tax evasion or sexual immorality, but all she managed to find was a history of visiting notorious web sites like BladeForums. Goldilocks did not know what Bladeforums was exactly, but she was pretty sure it was bad. Very very Bad. In her frustration, she started throwing stuff all around, breaking and smashing the Baer's things.
It was about this time that the Baer's arrived home after their peaceful walk through the woods. Poppa Baer, noting the broken window, and hearing the sounds of breaking glass and screaming from inside his house, immediately pulled his (you pick your favorite knife). Cautiously, he motioned his wife and son back, and entered his house, knowing full well that someone up to no good was inside.
What he found shocked him. Afraid of being discovered in the home of the Baers, Goldilocks had tried to escape out the sliding glass door at the back of the house while the Baers came in through the front door. Unfortunately, that door was covered by a curtain with a heavy pull sash. In her blind panic and terror at the idea of being caught by the dangerous Baers, she had somehow managed to get the drapery cord wrapped around her neck.
When Poppa Baer discovered her, she had turned blue and was gasping her last breaths of air and her eyes were bulging out in sheer terror. Poppa Baer quickly cut the cord with his knife and freed little Goldilocks. Once she had recovered a little, Poppa Baer walked her back across the street to have a little 'chat' with her parents, the Pacifists. Although they were shocked that their little girl had been so highly motivated by their Do Good thinking that she had committed several major crimes trying to 'get those Baers' for her parents, they were smart enough to realize that Poppa Baer's quick calm thinking and his knife had saved their poor pathetic daughters life.
The Pacifists then saw the utility of knife carry, and although they still don't have any guns, the Pacifists and the Baers lived happily ever after on their respective sides of the street. Little Baer and Goldilocks became the best of friends, eventually marrying, and having plenty more little Baers. And the Pacifists were no more.
That's my story, and I'm sticking to it...
Paracelsus, playing around
[This message has been edited by Paracelsus (edited 01-03-2001).]
