The Bronze Rat

A tourist walked into a Chinese curio shop in San
Francisco. While looking around at the exotic
merchandise, he noticed a very lifelike, life-sized,
bronze statue of a rat. It had no price tag, but was
so incredibly striking the tourist decided he must
have it. He took it to the old shop owner and
asked, "How much for the bronze rat?"

"Ahhh, you have chosen wisely! It is $12 for the
rat, $100 for the story," said the old Chinaman.

The tourist quickly pulled out twelve dollars.
"I'll just take the rat, you can keep the
story".

As he walked down the street carrying his bronze rat, the
tourist noticed that a few real rats had crawled out of the
alleys and sewers and had begun following him down the
street. This was a bit disconcerting so he began walking faster.
A couple blocks later he looked behind him and saw to his horror the
herd of rats behind him had grown to hundreds, and they
began squealing.

Sweating now, the tourist began to trot toward the Bay.
Again, after a couple blocks, he looked around only to
discover that the rats now numbered in the MILLIONS,
and were squealing and coming toward him faster and faster.
Terrified, he ran to the edge of the Bay and threw the
bronze rat as far as he could into the Bay. Amazingly, the
millions of rats all jumped into the Bay after the bronze
rat, and were all drowned.

The man walked back to the curio shop in Chinatown.
"Ahhh," said the owner, "You have come back for story?"
"No, sir." said the man, "I came back to see if you have
a bronze Democrat."

Hat tip to Dave T!



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