YOU CAN'T TAKE ME ANYWHERE

It was a special dinner. Karen's parent's, Maria's, and mine. We were eating downtown at The Palm, the restaurant in the Bellevue Strattford. At the table behind us were Bill Giles and Norman Braman, owners of the Phillies and Eagles, respectively. Earlier that evening we had seen about twenty bellhops surrounding this guy who was trying to get on the elevator. We looked closer and it was Muhammed Ali. His son had strayed, and Howard and I were play- duking it up with him, before he was dragged into the elevator.

Dinner went well, at least until dessert. We all got coffee and cheesecake, and Maria's mom made the mistake of telling a joke. It was a clean one, a Polish joke. The punch line was: "But this is a hardware store." Soon, everyone told his or her own. Finally, it was Karen's turn. Maria, as Karen started, dug her fingernails into my right knee. Howard did the same to my left.

The tables around us had been eavesdropping since we had started this joke thing, and Karen was well aware of her audience.

She said, "How do you get a nun pregnant?" I crossed my fingers under the table and shook my head. The hands on my knees tightened their grip.

Maria's father said, "I'll bite. How *do* you get a nun pregnant?"

"YOU *F*U*C*K* HER!!"

Oh man.