UNDERCLASSMAN

This morning when I was talking to the roofer, who had come to fix a winter ice-broken rooftile when we happened to be not at home (walking down by the lake to get some wild peppermint), he said that when he had arrived at the house (about 15 minutes after we'd left for the lake), the roof was covered with monkeys. Needless to say, the roof had been radiant with monkeylessness at the time of our departure, with no sign whatever of de facto imminent monkeyfulness.

This confirms my hypothesis that the hairy marauders have a comprehensive spy network linked to a garden watch committee. Our roof is never covered with monkeys while we are at home because the beasts know what will happen: they have it on their hard drives. The simian spies are watching and waiting for us to leave, when they signal the committee, which then gives the opposable thumbs-up to timely invasion by the entire tribe so as not to suffer the slings and arrows of apish fortune in the form of my accurate rocks, which accuracy I'm sure is factored into their finely tuned rampaging algorithm. That they do not so suffer is all the proof they need that they are in the right, as the hairy wind passes through my garden uncontested.

I sagely note that they glommed that last plum but did not touch the peppermint, lemon verbena, oregano, spearmint, lemon thyme, angelica, ginger, lemon balm, shisso, chives, St. John’s wort, Echinacea, basil, parsley, ginger or red pepper.

Slowly I acquire the necessary credits at Monkey University.