To Tell You The Truth

To Tell You The Truth one of these stories is fictional and one is well...a white lie...or not the truth...or based on truth...or fiction.

Can you guess which one it is? The answer is in a post I have hidden away in archives, and the link to that post is at the bottom of this post. But, don't cheat, see if you can guess, besides if you cheat I will catch you and feed you to my cat Simon, and To Tell You The Truth you don't want to meet my cat Simon.

The first story is entitled "Winston"

I awoke each morning after Christmas one year terrified of a monkey Santa brought my brother. The monkey was tiny and slept in the bed with my brother, but I was still afraid.
My mother finally put the monkey we decided to name "Winston" in a cage in what we called "our laundry room." (And I felt better when Winston had his own place.)


I made sure Winston stayed in his cage at night for fear he would end up in bed with me. He hissed at everyone but my brother and he had big teeth for such a little monkey. Plus, he was eerily quiet, which made me think of the expression, “As quiet as a mouse”, when actually mice are loud creatures, and we expect monkeys to be loud, but Winston didn’t make a sound- Although I think he was just quiet in the company of strangers.

After all, the monkey was in a strange place that smelled funny to him, listening to the inflection of different human voices pound his eardrums all day.

I listened to him humming a weird hum and pulling on the bars of his cage at night, right next door to my room in his newly furnished apartment.

My mother, who was furious with my stepfather for not discussing his “surprise” gift that Christmas, keep tirelessly looking for a solution, preferably one my brother could live with, because he loved Winston.

I guess she knew the monkey would be fine in a new home, since most of my family, besides my brother, knew Winston already had his bags packed anyway.

But thank goodness God often does for us what we cannot do for ourselves... or at least he did that year when it came to our problem with Winston.

One morning before daylight we heard a fire truck roll down our street and a woman screaming at the top of her lungs. It just so happened to be one of our neighbors running from Winston, who was behind her with her undergarments in one of his hands, and other ladies toiletries in the other, and what appeared to be toilet paper stuck to the bottom of one of his feet.

Winston tried to run at full speed, but he kept pulling his feet high in the air, like a walking horse in a parade, in an effort to shake the toilet paper off of the bottom of his foot.


Finally, it became hard to tell who was running behind who; but I saw the firefighter behind our neighbor, who was behind Winston, who came to a halt when he saw the hoses on the side of the fire truck. Luckily before anyone saw him Winston grabbed one of the fire hoses and perched himself on the side of the fire truck.

I guess he found the fire truck more interesting than the undergarments, because he glanced at the underwear in one hand, while he swung back and forth on the side of the truck with the other hand, uttering happy monkey noises we never heard before.

Then at some point, Winston realized he was holding the underwear with his only free hand, and he was going to have to decide which one he held in the highest esteem- his free hand or the underwear- because he was not letting go of the fire truck.


Hence, Winston continued to hold onto the hose and swing back and forth on the side of the truck; staring at our neighbors bra and underwear while slowly unfolding his hand finger by finger, letting the clothes slowly drop from his fingers to the pavement below.

Then a roar of laughter broke from the crowd that gathered around our pet, with the exception of course of one neighbor.

Incidentally, my brother had to pick up the toilet paper everywhere, but we helped and the fire department helped us find the right solution for everyone. God bless Winston.

And the next Story is entitled, Harold And Me

When I was fourteen, I worked at a fast food chicken place that prided itself on just that- fast food- in fact the service area was set up to move quickly. This privately owned company wanted their customers to get their order quickly during their lunch hour and return every day of the week.

Therefore, one of the restaurants main selling points was speed, so the quicker we moved an order out the better. I really liked the job; actually, all of my friends at my school liked the job, because of the adorable manager who managed the place.

However, like all things that seem too good to be true, this situation wasn’t any different, the drawback being the assistant manager and son of the owner, Harold.

Harold was the opposite of our charming good-looking manager. Whereas our manager Mark had dimples and the cutest smile, Harold had the weirdest looking face I’ve ever seen on a person and one I don't think I will ever forget. His eyes were straight across from each other, but perfectly aligned with one long eyebrow across the top of his forehead.

He had a small, Charlie Chaplin-like mouth and walked like Chaplin too, with a wobble. Oh, Harold hated me and especially after the following incident… although more were to follow...

On one of the many mornings Harold was screaming while we were filling orders ...I realized he was screaming at me. I had an altercation with the fry cook who was evidently a tattletale that told Harold all about our misunderstanding. Therefore, as soon as I came to work Harold was running toward me like a bull with his horns down, and face as red as a beet...

Well, first let me tell you how the restaurant set up, so that you can understand this story better...

The Restaurant was set up for the customer to see everything happening behind the counter with their food. The management team had a procedure set up to move orders quickly, and all the workers including whoever was frying the chicken were up front for the customers to view as they placed their order.

When you walked in the door the first thing you saw was the fryer frying the chicken. Then what we referred to as “a picker” picking the chicken, then “a bagger” who put the extra dinner orders, such as mashed potatoes, rice, etc… in a bag. The bagger would then pass the order to the “drink person” who made sure the order was correct, made the drinks, stapled the bag shut, and passed it to the customer, with a smile and a “Have a nice Day, Ma’am, or Sir.”

Well, I was the drink person, the one who made the drinks, made sure the order was correct, then stapled the bag, and gave it all to the customer with a smile, and a have a nice day.


Hence, Harold barreled toward me while I was checking the orders, making drinks, and stapling bags, from the back of the restaurant screaming in gibberish.

I tried to remain as calm as possible under the circumstances, which meant smiling at the customers, while I stapled the bags, which I couldn’t possibly check anymore because he was right in my face, so close I could smell his breath, and see the multicolored hair in his mustache.

Finally I said, “Harold you’re so close to me I can’t check the bags”

That’s when he started grabbing the bags from me, checking them, and tossing them back across the table for me to staple. It went on like this for a few minutes, him screaming at me in front of the customers, and me stapling the bags...until... I thought better of it, and began to staple his tie to his shirt as he went about his yelling and screaming.

These theatrics went on for awhile until the customers started laughing, because instead of getting a stapled bag, I just folded the top of the bag down, passed it to the customers and told them “Thank you, for coming to ____ and have a nice day.” Hence, Harold hadn’t a clue, until he heard the laughter in the corridor and saw his tie full of multiple staples attached to his shirt.

God bless Harold. Again, which story is true, you’ll find the answer in this link, but again, see if you can guess, and let me know your answer in comments...and remember don’t cheat, because I will catch you and feed you to my cat….Simon, and you do not want to meet Simon- To Tell You The Truth.