Ask Mr. Tom 13

Don't you believe it for a North Islip minute (It's not quite as quick.). For too many years, people have gone smugly about their business, believing that to be the case when, in point of brutal fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

This happy little world of make-believe came to a cataclysmic end one otherwise nondescript evening in 1997, when the demanding, highly persnickety food critic, Gaston d'Asperge sauntered incognito into the Fowl Play Bistro to sample and, hopefully, disparage the fare. A reasonable man, despite his exacting standards, he gave the establishment the opportunity to rise or fall with its flagship dish and, thus, ordered "the chef's special:" saucy goose with onion rings and an extra-thick shake.

Sad to say, the dinner turned out to be a disaster all around. The onion rings were insufficiently greasy to be worthy of the name, and, by that same standard, the beverage appears to have been stirred, not shaken, to the horror of the critic, who was an ardent 007 fan. But those were minor offenses, perhaps easily overlooked in the presence of a flirtatious, underdressed waitperson, and by "waitperson," I mean waitress. The deal-fracturer was the main course.

It took only one bite of same for d'Asperge to abruptly set down his fork, never to pick it up again.

"Pa-" he proclaimed, "tooey! This is not goose sauce on this goose, it is gander sauce! Just what kind of a stunt are you jokers trying to pull, anyway?"

Not only did he give the restaurant a bum review, he reported them at once to the AAA, the BBB and the FBI. Within the hour, dour, hammer-wielding functionaries were boarding the place up.

So, let that be a lesson, all you corner-cutters the world over. Sauce for the goose is sauce for the goose, and never the twain shall meet.

Whatever became of sarsaparilla?

It's still around, but just barely. It's gone so far underground, you would think it illegal. In fact, you might have an easier time finding a bag of marijuana in some places, though it will probably cost you a bit more and get you somewhat higher than would the soda pop. I don't know, it's been a long time since I used the stuff, so I could not say for sure. Of course, you know Mr. Tom is talking about sarsaparilla, right?

Some would have you believe it was the overwhelming popularity of the cola drinks that did the poor beverage in, but Mr. Tom has his doubts. After all, look at how voraciously people still guzzle birch beer by the gallon.

Before we venture any further into the murky fog of this mysterious disappearance, let us do a background check. Sarsaparilla is derived from the chemical element sarsparillium, still widely-used today as a vital ingredient in gaydar installations. It is known as "Spl" on the periodic chart and is a member of the anti-carbonate group, which means that the bubbles in the beverage will go in the opposite direction, which, in turn, means the burps the drink would otherwise induce go in the opposite direction as well. This contributed in some respect to make the soda a trifle unpopular amongst your crowded elevator set. But to say that, in and of itself, was the sole reason for its near demise would be folly of a magnitude that would put Mr. Seward's to shame.

In fact, despite its flatulent propensities, sarsaparilla was, at one time, the sine qua non of soft drinks. The only worthy competitor that even came close was a fruity red abomination, called Sandwich Island Punch, and their advertising slogan: "Drink some, or we shall have a native boy thrash you!" induced more fear than sales.

The death knell for the sarsaparillic refreshment came when a frustrated financier named Ebenezer Caesar got the idea of driving the price up by cornering the market, as the baronial robber, Jay Gould, had almost done with a variant of iron pyrite, known colloquially as "wise man's gold," on Dress Casually in Black Friday. Caesar snapped up all the sarsaparilla futures he could get his hands on, which, in the end, turned out to be all of them. Unbeknownst to him, the end came a little bit sooner than he planned, when he choked to death on a too-large bite of spam tenderloin with-make, if you will, note here of the cosmic irony-nary a bottle of sarsaparilla in sight to wash it down the hatch.

Unable to be sold off, as the newly-defunct speculator had planned them to be, the cornered bottles sat in a warehouse for decades, while enterprising entrepreneurs in Atlanta got the idea of adding stuff you put up your nose into their cola...and Mr. Tom does not mean nose drops. By the time local authorities got around to razing the late Mr. Caesar's forgotten warehouse to make room for a landfill, the damage had been done.

Where have all the flowers gone?

As in long time passing? Let's get real. Young migrant workers have picked them every one. When will we ever learn?

From there they have gone into extortionately-priced bouquets and double that for Mother's Day and triple it for Valentine's Day. That's where all the flowers have gone.

What's that you say, Mr. Tom? Are you trying to tell us the flowers that bloom in the spring (tra-la) have nothing to do with the case? In a word, yes.

If you are one of those benighted souls who believes that, among the possible forms of precipitation we might expect from time to time are pennies from Heaven, then you are surely aware that the official exchange rate has been pegged at one umbrella full for an indeterminate, but presumably generous amount of flowers, plus a good measure of sunshine thrown in for goodwill. Dream on. More likely, in today's rotten economy, you will get slugs from Heaven, and you can trade them in for weeds and ozone damage.

You are correct in your perception that you have caught Mr. Tom in a somewhat disjovial state, and if that seems to grate, well, tough mammary gland. In keeping with the theme, for all Mr. Tom cares, you can send him dead flowers by the U.S. mail.