It goes without saying (which is a good reason for saying it), Hannibal King is an educated man. He has multiple degrees in a vast array of subject matter. He knows things that many people don’t even know can be known. He has forgotten how many things he knows. He is comfortable in knowing that what he doesn’t know has yet to be discovered.

But, Hannibal is not the only well-educated person, lurking within the Center of the Universe. Ingmar Norska, the Norwegian travel agent, endangered Viking, and reformed anti-animal licensing scoundrel, enjoys walking right up next to — but never quite crossing over into — Academia. On one hand, he reads “Beowulf” in Old English. On the other, he falls afoul of the law for crimes of a minimally criminal nature.

It was under these circumstances that Hannibal King first met Ingmar, the bad boy of Norwegian summer fjord cruising (a season that only lasts two weeks). Ingmar was serving out community service sentencing for failure to license his dog, while serving nearly expired mashed potatoes at the Shelter for Abused Artists and Intellectuals. Hannibal was the Primary Hash-Slinger and Controller of the “Uncontrollable” (as the community service “volunteers” are known).

“You seem to be someone that knows a bit about some things,” Hannibal matter-of-factly commented to Ingmar, once he had gotten over his disdain for anyone that could be so calloused as to fail to license their dog. “Where did you go to college?”

Not to be over “matter-of-facted”, Ingmar yawned as he plopped a ladle full of soupy potatoes on the waiting plate of a down and out artist, scratched behind his left ear, and mumbled in his most inarticulate, “I don’t give a flyin’ flip,” tone, “I have an AAS from Southwestern, a BS from Northwestern, a BLT from Western, and a PhD. in Cognitive Confusion from the Douglass Adams School of Deep Thought.”

“I attended Deep Thought!” Hannibal exclaimed; jubilant at meeting a fellow D-T alum. “Go 42,” he chanted as he pretended to twirl a towel around his head. “What were your favorite courses?”

“The Study of Redundant Studies.”

“Great course. I took it twice.”

“Disassociation Networking.”

“I think Firesign asked it best, ‘How can you be in two places at once, when you are nowhere at all?’”

“Unravelling String Theory.”

“That was a tough one for me. Eventually, I just tied a knot in it and called it quits.”

“Suspended Gravitational Belief.”

“I floated right through that one.”

“Non-Motivational Speaking.”

“I didn’t get a thing out of that course. I might have, but I just wasn’t feeling it.”

“Inconsequential Math.”

“I didn’t take that one. I wanted to, but I was told it wasn’t important.”

From this shared intellectual background, Hannibal and Ingmar forged a very needy, symbiotic relationship. Hannibal would pompously share all that he knew and Ingmar would nonchalantly comment that, “The only thing you don’t know is the extent of what you don’t know.”

I’ve heard that’s what makes good drinking buddies.

 

Larry Wilson is a mostly lifelong resident of Niles. His optimistic “glass full to overflowing” view of life shapes his writing. His essays stem from experiences, compilations and recollections from friends and family. Wilson touts himself as “a dubiously licensed teller of tall tales, sworn to uphold the precept of ‘It’s my story; that’s the way I’m telling it.’” He can be reached at wflw@hotmail.com.