My sister’s family joined us for Easter this year. It was the usual chaos and enthusiasm as we piled into the minivan to go to church. The C & E crowd used up all the parking spaces in the main lot, so we had to hike a bit to reach the church. My niece is awfully cute, but awfully short and she was slowing us all down, so I tossed her up on my shoulders (even though my sister seemed to think that she should walk) and we chatted on our way to church. My cute little niece started asking lots of questions (apparently my answers are far more entertaining than her parents’ answers) about the Easter Bunny, and then she stumbled on the dreaded follow-up inquiry: “Uncle Alex, whatever happened to Snow White?”
Since I was huffing and puffing my way up the road from the special holiday satellite parking, I didn’t really have the time or energy to spin my answer so in light of my sister’s preference for telling the truth (and since the truth wasn’t so bad), I decided to fill her in…
Once upon a time… our favorite Princess Councilmember Darling Dottie was facing a recall election and probable banishment from the Golden Palace. As you might recall, Doc Riddler and Happy John Gieseke tried to block the attack on Darling Dottie, but even Prince Joe could not save her from the attacks of Perilous Patty. The vain and wicked Perilous Patty used evil spells to conjure up her dark nights, Terrible Tom and Krazy Ken, and they helped her to get back at Doc Riddler by attacking Darling Dottie. They schemed and conspired and recruited other dark souls to help with the cause. Cowboy Carl and Cowboy Ray were signed on to help with the campaign, but Doc Riddler never gave up.
Even after Perilous Patty’s witch-in-training, Ludicrous Linda Meyer, produced enough signatures to place the recall election on the ballot, our heroine refused to surrender. Doc Riddler submitted his concerns to the top law enforcement officer of the land and Constable Swope launched an investigation of the recall effort underway at the Golden Palace. Perilous Patty and Ludicrous Linda continued their attacks on Doc Riddler and Darling Dottie and things certainly looked grim.
Ludicrous Linda and her mouthpiece, Krazy Kielty Junior, continued to come to the meetings of the council to spew their venom and hatred and still our heroes stood strong. Constable Swope continued his investigation and Junior was forced to represent many of the participants in Perilous Patty’s scheme during the investigation. Constable Swope found proof of skullduggery sent a letter to all the subjects of the land. Darling Dottie asked the Judge to do the right thing, but her recall election stayed on the ballot.
It turns out that Perilous Patty’s band of marauders, bandits and thieves under the leadership of Ludicrous Linda may have engaged in a bit of fraud when they collected their bounty per signature. These outsiders were so greedy that at least one dangerous damsel admitted to the criminal act of forging some of the signatures on the petition she turned in. There have been other accusations of similar conduct, and Constable Swope is still investigating the matter. Of course, Ludicrous Linda claimed no knowledge of such wrongdoing and really, what’s a few forgeries in a land where Perilous Patty has been caught fleecing the taxpayer’s coffers many times.
Perilous Patty’s sinful ambition will hopefully prove to be her downfall in the end. Darling Dottie’s subjects saw through this pathetic effort on the part of Perilous Patty and Ludicrous Linda. Rumor had it that Ludicrous Linda wanted Darling Dottie’s seat on the Council. Luckily for the subjects, their efforts were rebuffed and Darling Dottie survived the recall effort handily. Hopefully, Perilous Patty’s next onslaught against Doc Riddler’s strong and wise leadership of the Council will be defeated as well when Sneezy Mark Brown survives the recall effort aimed at unseating him. Doc Riddler ultimately runs a better campaign than his enemies, and he was able to soundly defeat the rather uninspired efforts of Cowboy Carl and Cowboy Ray to recall Darling Dottie. Perhaps the Cowboy duo spent too much time fishing to properly run the campaign to recall Darling Dottie.
It turns out that Grumpy Bob Hoepfner was a stalking horse, and it was actually Magic Mirror Kneemiller who wanted to take over Doc Riddler’s position as Council President. See, Perilous Patty always wanted to be Council President too, so installing Magic Mirror Kneemiller would be the next best thing. Magic Mirror Kneemiller was quite used to telling Perilous Patty what she wants to hear. Besides, Dopey Larry Muench is a mute and Bashful Jerry Reese can’t be trusted anymore than Grumpy Bob Hoepfner. The rest of Perilous Patty’s gang should take heed. The subjects have spoken and they have had enough of Perilous Patty and her evil plan to take over the kingdom. Interestingly, Sleepy Mike Weller proved to be fairly awake on election day when he actively campaigned to have Darling Dottie recalled. Ultimately, the palace coup was unsuccessful. Doc Riddler still holds his five votes and Darling Dottie will stay on the Council.
A lesson for Perilous Patty and her motley crew, enough already. The good people of St. Charles want you to get back to the business of the people, not the business of Perilous Patty taking over the kingdom for her own personal gain.
This fairy tale had a happy ending and good triumphed over evil in the end. Perilous Patty and her dark knights will no doubt come back to fight another day, but Darling Dottie has returned to the Golden Palace in triumph and she will live happily ever after...
