Keith Stewart has been making me laugh ever since I met him, but this weekend, I laughed because of his fantastic book, Bernadette Peters Hates Me: True Tales of a Delusional Man.
It’s hard to imagine that all of these incidents could have happened to one man. Let’s start with the time he was attacked by a bird in a supermarket. Here’s an excerpt:
“Why be scared of such a tiny bird? Why be so bitter towards a poor, struggling animal? Perhaps I am overreacting, you say? I beg to differ. A couple of years ago, I was accosted by an angry, terrified bird in a Kroger MegaGrand Store. I honestly can say I will never be the same, and neither will that dumb bird. Here’s how it went down:
“I ran into the grocery after work to pick up a few items. For convenience, I stopped at the store that was closer to work, so it was not my home Kroger. All the produce was placed in completely different places, and I walked around aimlessly trying to find the organic section, in particular, the celery. I was standing in front of a large display of carefully pyramided cantaloupe when out of the corner of my eye, I spotted something dark and ominous. It was a bird, maybe a sparrow, flying at what appeared to be the speed of a fully engrossed Indy car. I stood there and thought to myself, “Huh, that bird looks like it’s flying directly toward me.” The next thing I know I feel something repeatedly beating me about the head and ear, and I hear the FLAP FLAP FLAP of bird wings. “OH GOD! HELP ME!” I yelled, flailing both arms up in the air trying to fight off the crazed bird. I was feeling around for a celery stalk to use as a sword, and in my panic, I jumped back directly into the large display of cantaloupe. At this point, the bird had tired of terrorizing me and had flown away to target its next victim over in the dairy section, but I was still flailing my arms, rolling in the floor with about fifty cantaloupes.” Read the whole piece at humoroutcasts.com.
There’s also the time he rubbed jalapeno pepper juice in a place he especially should NOT have. There’s the time he and his cousins brawled with another family at a funeral. There’s the title piece about why Broadway legend Bernadette Peters really does hate him. I’m just tipping the ice berg here. You’ll have to read the book for yourself. In the meantime, you can follow Keith’s latest exploits online on Facebook or at www.astrongmanscupoftea.com.
Denton Loving 