He ran into the room, his heart pounding, and his clothes soaking wet.

"I just ate a fire hydrant," he said.

Mom and I were drinking tea by the fire. Now mom's brow furrowed.

"Donald, whatever do you mean?"

Donald peeled up his soaking wet shirt so we could see the hydrant protruding through his skin. I could see flecks of red paint trying to break through the skin above his solar plexus.

Mom went into the kitchen and came back with some pliers.

"We have to remove that hydrant," she said.

She stuck the pliers down his throat and mom and I hauled until the fire hydrant popped out. Holding on to the fire hydrant was Ronald McDonald.

"Ho ho ho," Ronald McDonald laughed. "I sure could go for some delicious McDonalds Happy Meals and French Fries about now."

Mom, who's only eaten iceberg lettuce since 1978, told Ronald to shove the Happy Meals up his ass.

This made Ronald very unhappy. He started to cry. Only he didn't weep tears, he wept ketchup. Ketchup began to pour from his tear duct like a water faucet. Soon we were ankle deep in ketchup. The dog liked it. He started eating ketchup and this made him sick and he started shitting ketchup, which he just ate again. It was a vicious circle.

Soon little pink fluffballs began to appear in the ketchup. The fluffballs grew to be three inches across and they started eating the house. One of them ate the table lamp in one chomp. And the fire hydrant itself, well, it was just lying on the floor as alone as one of Hemingway's protagonists.

"This reminds me," Mom said. "We need to buy floss.: