Walls 'R Us

Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking at Rutgersam glad she will finally get her answer as to the
University in front of around 150 high school students,definition of a walrus, and will hopefully even get to
which was a lot better than speaking behind them.see a walrus wearing a dress, it makes me think that
The subject was humor columns, so it goes withoutnone of us -- and I do mean none of us -- have
saying that walruses came up multiple times. I mean,done our job of correctly promoting walruses...So
so many times that I completely lost track. Like, atwith that, I plan to change everything. And I don't
least seven times. As is evident from my enthusiasm,mean that I will convert all of my dollars into
I felt proud to include walruses because they are leftquarters; I mean that I will do whatever I can to
out of so many aspects of society: sleep-overs,inform people of the past, present and future of
camping trips, and even games of Monopoly, which iswalruses. I will tell them of their many purposes:
a shame because I think they'd be pretty good atopening cans, playing whisker violins and even serving
it...But then it happened. When the speech ended, Ias very large paper weights for when a rock simply
was approached by a girl who told me that her friendwon't cut it. A year from now, or maybe even
did not know what a walrus was. My immediatetomorrow, I want to be able to stand at a random
thought was that maybe she was kidding. She had tostreet corner -- preferably one where there is no
be, right? I mean, these are walruses we're talkingcrime taking place -- and yell out "walrus!" and
about here, not some unpopular animal like a dog or asomeone will yell back to me that a walrus would be
cat. But she was not kidding at all, so I needed toa great letter opener or that a walrus could be a
resort to explaining characteristics of a walrus:They'restate senator if not for its inability to speak, or sign
like seals but with fangs, I first told her.And theydocuments, or use ATM machines, among other
have whiskers, I added, and they are really heavyminor technicalities...And when all is said and done, if
and live in the water.But she still was not familiar withone walrus comes up to me to shake my hand and
it, despite my very vivid details. In retrospect, maybethank me, then I will know my time has been well
I should have mentioned that a walrus is a lot likespent...But I digress.Greg Gagliardi is a teacher and
Toys 'R Us but with an incorrectly spelled wallwriter. His stream-of-consciousness weekly humor
replacing the toys. However, I don't know if thatcolumn, "Progressive Revelations," has been ongoing
would have worked either. Alas, she walked awaysince 1998.
telling me that she would look it up on Google. While I