You Keep Sayin' You've Got Somethin' For Me.

I saw Zane sitting there at the pub, looking more morose than usual. If you knew Zane, you might think that this extra moodyness might go unnoticed like a fart in a sewage treatment plant, because he's a pretty morose guy anyway. But I knew that this moroseness was a special moroseness, and I asked him the cause of its specialness.

"Aw.. well," he began morosely, "I just bought a cow."

Thinking that this was some new kind of depressed-person slang, I politely chuckled and asked him to elaborate.

"No, I mean it, I bought a cow. And this cow is pretty special," he looked around the room suspiciously, and whispered, "This cow gives... It gives chocolate milk."

Laughing at his cleverness and skill at "winding me up", as the British say, I said something to the effect that he was clever and skillful. This typically would have cheered him up; as you might know the chronically depressed are, counterintuitively, intensely enamored of themselves and snort up any compliment with the zeal of a coke addict circa 1983.

And yet he remained as sad as before, his sad-clown face threatened to break out into sad tears of sorrow. I could see he was serious about the cow, and asked him to explain further.

"Well, I was driving along the road last Saturday, looking for tall bridges and cliffs... sorta a hobby of mine... and I saw this old farmer on the side of the road with a cow and a sign that said 'FOR SALE CHOCOLATE MILK COW'. Some small spark of childhood curiosity floated up from the depths, and I pulled over to check it out. The farmer welcomed me with some observations about the clouds and the temperature, and proceeded to squeeze the cow's teat directly into a glass mug. What he held up to me to taste defied reason: a cold, frothy glass of what appeared to be chocolate milk. I tasted it. And it was good. Really good. Chocolate milk has always been my favorite..." [Notice that clinical depression seems to foster an appetite for chocolate. This is especially pronounced in depressed women. Just an observation.] "...and though I had never really considered what attributes would be desireable in a cow, surely giving cold chocolate milk on demand would be one of them: I bought her on the spot and took her home. She's living in my kitchen now."

I silently wondered how he had managed to fit a whole cow into his Volkswagon Beetle, one of the new kind. Perhaps chocolate giving cows are smaller.

"So, you see my dilemma?" he asked, and took a swig of his beer (Bud-Lite, warm).

He had a rather small studio apartment, perhaps having livestock in one's kitchen was a problem, but depending on the size of this thing, maybe it was worth it for good chocolate milk, especially really good chocolate milk. I asked him if his apartment building allowed large pets.

He looked at me with a vague disgust/disbelief. "My dilemma is that now that I have chocolate milk whenever I want it, I'll get used to always having it."

I squinted my eyes and traced a figure eight on the table as I thought. What could be the problem with always having chocolate milk? Too fattening perhaps? I voiced my question.

"The problem?! Ok, so let's say I'm just drinkin' my chocolate milk, everyday, mmm-mmm chocolate milk, drink drink drink..." [By the way, his smart-ass style of storytelling, especially when he was excited/angry, greatly annoyed me. I reproduce it here in all its ten-a-penny wit.] "...Well, one day, I go into the kitchen, what do I see? Oh no! Boom: dead cow. Sorry Zaney pal, no more chocolate milk for you... What will I do then?"

It was one of those impossibly logical questions that the sullen of the world seem to have spilling from their pockets. Teasing him out of his knot of rationality would take some delicacy.

I recited the old saying, "Better to have loved and lost..." but replaced "love" with "drink chocolate milk". I had hoped my slow-pitch humor would amuse him somewhat, though as soon as I said it I realized it might have the opposite effect.

He surprised me, relenting a little, "I suppose you might be right about that..." But having tempered the blade of his logic with a dram of practicality, he renewed his assault on joy, sharper than before: "...so what I think I will do is just have chocolate milk every once in awhile, like maybe once a year, at least until I know that the cow won't be dropping dead anytime soon. The longer the cow is around, the longer I can be sure that she will be around later. I think I'll then feel safer to indulge in my cocoa-lactic desires. If you think about it, this is the most effiecient method for..."

He continued with his systematic explaination. "Game theory" was mentioned. "Balance of power" was invoked. Several metaphors, some more clear than others, were proposed.

I was impressed. His plan had the ring of sensibility, but something was wrong with the deeper philosophy behind such manner of thought, almost diabolically wrong.

As he spoke I felt as though I were caught up in a flash flood, the implications of his words struck at me like debris, snapped branches and broken glass, roiling up in the torrent to snag and cut at me before sinking again into unintelligibility. The logic centers of my brain were struggling to parse his meaning, thrashing simply to keep afloat. If. Then. Therefore. However. I could offer no sensible rebuttal, I had nothing solid on which to grab hold. From the shore, I heard someone yell, "What about the cow?"

Ah! What about the cow! I wondered aloud how the cow might feel about this arrangement of his.

He paused his lecture. "What about the cow?" he said with his eyebrows.

I began to repeat my question, but stopped; the echo of my voice bouncing back from the brick wall of his face sounded ridiculous, nasal and thin.

I guess a cow was a cow.

He continued on with his dialectics, employing now and then some beernuts to illustrate his calculations, "Now if you imagine this peanut to be the equilibrium point-Y, and this peanut to..."

I imagined the cow in his kitchen while he was at work, getting into his pantries, chewing through the box of Cocopuffs, the puffs scattering across the linoleum. I laughed to myself.

I wished very much for some chocolate milk.